The Vision; or, Hell, purgatory and paradise

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THE

VISION OF DANTE.

MORRISON AND GIBB, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH,

THE "ALBION" EDITION.

The Vision;

OR,

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OF

DANTE ALIGHIERI.

TRANSLATED BY

The Rev. HENRY FRANCIS CARY, A.M.

WITH A LIFE OF DANTE, CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW OF HIS AGE,
ADDITIONAL NOTES, AND AN INDEX.

LONDON :

FREDERICK WARNE AND CO.

AND NEW YORK.

1894.

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PKEFACE.

FN" the years 1805 and 1806, I published the First Part of the
following Translation, with the Text of the Original. Since
that period, two impressions of the whole of the Divina
Commedia, in Italian, have made their appearance in this
country. It is not necessary that I should add a third : and I
am induced to hope that the Poem, even in the present version
of it, may not be without interest for the mere English reader.

The Translation of the Second and Third Parts, "The
Purgatory" and "The Paradise," was begun long before the
First, and as early as the year 1797 ; but, owing to many
interruptions, not concluded till the summer before last. On
a retrospect of the time and exertions that have been thus
employed, I do not regard those hours as the least happy of my
life, during which (to use the eloquent language of Mr. Cole-
ridge) " my individual recollections have been suspended, and
lulled to sleep amid the music of nobler thoughts ; " nor that
study misapplied, which has familiarized me with one of the
sublimest efforts of the human invention.

To those, who shall be at the trouble of examining into the
degree of accuracy with which the task has been executed, I
may be allowed to suggest, that their judgment should not be
formed on a comparison with any single text of my Author ;
since, in more instances than I have noticed, I have had to

vi PREFACE.

make my choice out of a variety of readings and interpretations,
presented by different editions and commentators.

In one or two of those editions is to be found the title of
"The Vision;" which I have adopted, as more conformable to
the genius of our language than that of "The Divine Comedy."
Dante himself, I believe, termed it simply "The Comedy;"
in the first place, because the style was of the middle kind ; and
in the next, because the story (if story it may be called) ends
happily.

January, 1814.

When a Third Edition was called for in 1831, my duties as
an Assistant Librarian in the British Museum were such as to
prevent me from engaging in any task that would have required
an increase of sedentary labour. I was thus hindered not only
from attending to the accuracy of the press, (which indeed the
care of my Publisher rendered almost unnecessary,) but from
collecting and putting in order the several corrections and
additions, which I had occasionally noted with the purpose of
introducing them into that edition.

A long interval of leisure may since have enabled me to do
more effectually what I was before compelled to leave undone.
In the hope of rendering the Life of Dante and tbe Notes on
the Poem less imperfect, I have consulted most of the writers
by whom my Author has been recently illustrated. "Wherever
an omission or an error in the translation has been pointed out
to me, I have done my best to supply the one and to correct the
other ; and my obligations in all these instances are acknow-
ledged in the Notes. Among those who have not thought a
few hours thrown away in noticing such oversights, it is
gratifying to me to mention the names of Mr. Carlyle, one of
the most original thinkers of our time ; my long experienced

PKEFACE. vii

friend, Mr. Darley, one of our most genuine poets ; and Mr.
Lyell, my respected fellow-labourer in the mine of Dante. At
an advanced age, I do not imagine myself capable of otherwise
improving an attempt which, however defective, has at least the
advantage of having had my earlier days bestowed on it.

February, 1844.

CONTENTS.

PA.QF.

PREFACE v

LIFE OF DANTE xi

CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW OF THE AGE OF DANTE . . xli

THE VISION OF DANTE :

HELL, Canto I.— XXXIV 1

PURGATORY, Canto L— XXXIII 163

PARADISE, Canto I.— XXXIII 329

INDEX 83

ix

LIFE OF DANTE.

DANTE,1 a name abbreviated, as was the custom in those days,
from Durante or Durando, was of a very ancient Florentine
family. The first of his ancestors,2 concerning whom anything
certain is known, was Cacciaguida,3 a Florentine knight, who died
fighting in the holy war, under the Emperor Conrad III. Caccia-
guida had two brothers, Moronto and Eliseo, the former of whom is
not recorded to have left any posterity ; the latter is the head of the
family of the Elisei, or perhaps (for it is doubtful which is the case)
only transmitted to his descendants a name which he had himself
inherited. From Cacciaguida himself were sprung the Alighieri, so
called from one of his sons, who bore the appellation from his
mother's family,4 as is affirmed by the Poet himself, under the
person of Cacciaguida, in the fifteenth canto of the Paradise. This
name, Alighieri, is derived from the coat of arms,5 a wing or, on a
field azure, still borne by the descendants of our Poet at Verona, in
the days of Leonardo Aretino.

Dante was born at Florence in May, 1265. His mother's name

1 A note by Salvini, on Muratori delta Per/. Poes. Ital. lib. 3. cap. viii.

2 Leonardo Aretino, Vita di Dante.

3 Par. xv. He was born, as most have supposed, in 1106, and died about
1147. But Lombardi computes his birth to have happened about 1090. See
note to Par. xvi. 31. For what is known of his descendants till the birth of
Dante, see Note to Par. xv. 86.

4 Vellutello, Vita di Dante. There is reason to suppose that she was the
daughter of Aldigerio, who was a lawyer of Verona, and brother of one of the
same name, bishop of that city, and author of an epistle addressed to his
mother, a religious recluse, with the title of Tractatus Adalgeri Episc. ad
Kosuvidam reclausam (or, ad Orismundam matrem inclusam) de Rebus moral-
ibus. See Cancellieri, Osservazioni, etc. Roma, 1818, p. 119.

5 Pelli describes the arms differently. Memorie per la Vita di Dante.
Opere di Dante, ediz. Zatta, 1758, torn. iv. part ii. p. 16. The male line
ended in Pietro, the sixth in descent from our Poet, and father of Ginevra,
married in 1549 to the Conte Marcantonio Sarego, of Verona. Pelli, p. 19.

xii LIFE OF DANTE.

was Bella, but of what family is no longer known. His father l he
had the misfortune to lose in his childhood ; but by the advice of
his surviving relations, and with the assistance of au able preceptor,
Brunetto Latini, he applied himself closely to polite literature and
other liberal studies, at the same time that he omitted no pursuit
necessary for the accomplishment of a manly character, and mixed
with the youth of his age in all honourable and noble exercises.

In the twenty-fourth year of his age, he was present at the
memorable battle of Campaldino,2 where he served in the foremost
troop of cavalry, and was exposed to imminent danger. Leonardo
Aretino refers to a letter of Dante, in which he described the order
of that battle, and mentioned his having been engaged in it. The
cavalry of the Aretini at the first onset gained so great an advantage
over the Florentine horse, as to compel them to retreat to their body
of infantry. This circumstance in the event proved highly fortunate
to the Florentines ; for their own cavalry being thus joined to their
foot, while that of their enemies was led by the pursuit to a con-
siderable distance from theirs, they were by these means enabled to
defeat with ease their separate forces. In this battle, the Uberti,
Lamberti, and Abati, with all the other ex- citizens of Florence who
adhered to the Ghibelline 3 interest, were with the Aretini ; while
those inhabitants of Arezzo, who, owing to their attachment to the
Guelph s party, had been banished from their own city, were ranged
on the side of the Florentines. In the following year, Dante took
part in another engagement between his countrymen and the citizens
of Pisa, from whom they took the castle of Caprona,4 situated not far
from that city.

From what the Poet has told us in his treatise, entitled the Vita
Nuova, we learn that he was a lover long before he was a soldier,
and that his passion for the Beatrice whom he has immortalized,
commenced 5 when she was at the beginning and he near the end of
his ninth year. Their first meeting was at a banquet in the house
of Folco Portinari 6 her father ; and the impression, then made on

1 His father Alighiero had been before married to Lapa, daughter of
Chiarissimo Cialuffi ; and by her had a son named Francesco, who left two
daughters, and a son, whom he named Durante after his brother. Francesco
appears to have been mistaken for a son of our Poet's. Boccaccio mentions
also a sister of Dante, who was married to Poggi, and was the mother of Andrea
Poggi, Boccaccio's intimate. Pelli, p. 267.

2 G. Villani describes this engagement, lib. 7. cap. cxxx.

3 For the supposed origin of these denominations, see Note to Par. vi. 107.

4 Hell, xxi. 92.

5 See also the beginning of the Vita Nitova.

6 Folco di Ricovero Portinari was the founder of the hospital of S. Maria

LIFE OF DANTE. xiii

the susceptible and constant heart of Dante, was not obliterated by
her death, which happened after an interval of sixteen years.

But neither war, nor love, prevented Dante from gratifying the
earnest desire which he had of knowledge and mental improvement.
By Benvenuto da Imola, one of the earliest of his commentators, it
is related, that he studied in his youth at the universities of Bologna
and Padua, as well as in that of his native city, and devoted himself
to the pursuit of natural and moral philosophy. There is reason to
believe that his eagerness for the acquisition of learning, at some
time of his life, led him as far as Paris, and even Oxford ; 1 in the
former of which universities he is said to have taken the degree of a

Nuova, in 1280, and of other charitable institutions, and died in 1289, as
appeared from his epitaph. Pelli, p. 55.

1 Giovanni Villani, who was his contemporary, and, as Villani himself says,
his neighbour in Florence, informs us, that "he went to study at Bologna, and
then to Paris, and to many parts of the world," (an expression that may well
include England,) " subsequently to his banishment." Hist. lib. 9. cap. cxxxv.
Indeed, as we shall see, it is uncertain whether he might not have been more
than once a student at Paris.

But the fact of his having visited England rests on a passage alluding to it
in the Latin poems of Boccaccio, and on the authority of Giovanni da Serra-
valle, Bishop of Fermo, who, as Tiraboschi observes, though he lived at the
distance of a century from Dante, might have known those who were
contemporaries with him. This writer, in an inedited commentary on the
Commedia, written while he was attending the council of Constance, says of
our Poet : " Anagorice dilexit theologiam sacram, in qua diu studuit tarn in
Oxoniis in regno Anglise, quam Parisiis in regno Franciae," etc. And again:
" Dantes se in juventute dedit omnibus artibus liberalibus, studens eas Paduse,
Bononise, demum Oxoniis et Parisiis, ubi fecit multos actus mirabiles, intantum
quod ab aliquibus dicebatur magnus philosophus, ab aliquibus magnus Theo-
logus, ab aliquibus magnus poeta." Tiraboschi, Stor. Delia Poes. Ital. vol. ii.
cap. iv. p. 14, as extracted from Tiraboschi's great work by Mathias, and edited
by that gentleman. Lond. 1803.

The bishop translated the poem itself into Latin prose, at the instance of
Cardinal Amedeo di Saluzzo, and of two English bishops, Nicholas Bubwith,
of Bath, and Robert Halam, of Salisbury, who attended the same council.
One copy only of the version and commentary is known to be preserved, and
that is in the Vatican. I would suggest the probability of others existing in
this country. Stillingfleet, in the Origines Sacrce, twice quotes passages from
the Paradiso, "rendered into Latin," (and it is Latin prose,) as that learned
bishop says, "by F. S." Orig. Sacr. b. 2. chap. ix. sec. xviii. § 4, and
chap. x. sec. v. edit. Cambridge, 1701. See Notes to Par. xxiv. 86, and 104.
This work was begun in February 1416, and finished in the same month of the
following year.

The word "anagorice " (into which the Italians altered "anagogice ") which
occurs in the former of the above extracts, is explained by Dante in the
Convito. Opere di Dante, torn. i. p. 43, ediz. Venez. 1793, and more briefly
by Field. Of the Church, b. 3. cap. 26. "The Anagogicall " sense is, " when
the things literally expressed unto us do signifie something in the state of
heaven's happiness." It was used by the Greek Fathers to signify merely a
more recondite sense in a text of Scripture than that which the plain words
offered. See Origen in Routh's Reliquice Sacra;, vol. iv. p. 323.

xiv LIFE OF DANTE.

Bachelor, and distinguished himself in the theological disputations ;
but to have been hindered from commencing Master, by a failure in
his pecuniary resources. Francesco da Buti, another of his commen-
tators in the fourteenth century, asserts that he entered the order of
the Frati Minori, but laid aside the habit before he was professed.

In his own city, domestic troubles, and yet more severe public
calamities, awaited him. In 1291, he was induced, by the solicitation
of his friends, to console himself for the loss of Beatrice by a
matrimonial connexion with Gemma, a lady of the noble family of
the Donati, by whom he had a numerous offspring. But the violence
of her temper proved a source of the bitterest suffering to him ;
and in that passage of the Inferno, where one of the characters
says,

La fiera moglie piu ch' altro, mi nuoce. Canto xvi.

me, my wife

Of savage temper, more than aught beside,
Hath to this evil brought,

his own conjugal unhappiness must have recurred forcibly and
painfully to his mind.1 It is not improbable that political animosity
might have had some share in these dissensions ; for his wife was a
kinswoman of Corso Donati, one of the most formidable, as he was
one of the most inveterate of his opponents.

In 1300 he was chosen chief of the Priors, who at that time
possessed the supreme authority in the state ; his colleagues being
Palmieri degli Altoviti and Neri di Jacopo degli Alberti. From
this exaltation our Poet dated the cause of all his subsequent mis-
fortunes in life.2

In order to show the occasion of Dante's exile, it may be
necessary to enter more particularly into the state of parties at
Florence. The city, which had been disturbed by many divisions
between the Guelphs and Ghibellines, at length remained in the
power of the former ; but after some time these were again split into
two factions. This perverse occurrence originated with the inhabit-
ants of Pistoia, who, from an unhappy quarrel between two power-

1 Yet M. Artaud, in his Hisloire de Dante (8vo, Paris, 1841, p. 85),
represents Gemma as a tender, faithful, and affectionate wife. I certainly do
not find any mention of her unhappy temper in the early biographers. Regard
for her or for her children might have restrained them. But in the next
century, Landino, though commending her good qualities, does not scruple to
assert that in this respect she was more than a Xanthippe.

2 Leonardo Aretino. A late biographer, on the authority of Marchionne
Stefani, assigns different colleagues to Dante in his office of Prior. See Balbo,
Vita di Dante, vol. i. p. 219, ediz. Torin, 1839.

LIFE OF DANTE. xv

ful families in that city, were all separated into parties known
by those denominations. With the intention of composing their
differences, the principals on each side were summoned to the city
of Florence ; but this measure, instead of remedying the evil, only
contributed to increase its virulence, by communicating it to the
citizens of Florence themselves. For the contending parties were
so far from being brought to a reconciliation, that each contrived to
gain fresh partisans among the Florentines, with whom many of
them were closely connected by the ties of blood and friendship ;
and who entered into the dispute with such acrimony and eagerness,
that the whole city was soon engaged either on one part or the other,
and even brothers of the same family were divided. It was not
long before they passed, by the usual gradations, from contumely to
violence. The factions were now known by the names of the Neri
and the Bianchi, the former generally siding with the Guelphs or
adherents of the papal power, the latter with the Ghibellines or
those who supported the authority of the Emperor. The Neri
assembled secretly in the church of the Holy Trinity, and deter-
mined on interceding with Pope Boniface VIII. to send Charles
of Valois to pacify and reform the city. No sooner did this re-
solution come to the knowledge of the Bianchi, than, struck with
apprehension at the consequences of such a measure, they took arms,
and repaired to the Priors ; demanding of them the punishment of
their adversaries, for having thus entered into private deliberations
concerning the state, which they represented to have been done with
the view of expelling them from the city. Those who had met,
being alarmed in their turn, had also recourse to arms, and made
their complaints to the Priors. Accusing their opponents of having
armed themselves without any previous public discussion ; and
affirming that, under various pretexts, they had sought to drive
them out of their country, they demanded that they might be
punished as disturbers of the public tranquillity. The dread and
danger became general, when, by the advice of Dante, the Priors
called in the multitude to their protection and assistance ; and then
proceeded to banish the principals of the two factions, who were
these : Corso Donati,1 Geri Spini, Giachonotto de' Pazzi, Rosso della
Tosa, and others of the Nera party, who were exiled to the Castello
della Pieve in Perugia ; and of the Bianca party, who were
banished to Serrazana, Gentile and Torrigiano de' Cerchi, Guido
Cavalcanti,2 Baschiera della Tosa, Baldinaccio Adimari, Naldo son

1 Of this remarkable man, see more in the Purg. xxiv. 81.

2 See Notes to Hell, x. 59, and Purg. xi. 96.

xvi LIFE

OF TANr

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of Lottino Gherardini, and others. On this occasioi
accused of favouring the Bianehi, though he appears to have con-
ducted himself with impartiality ; and the deliberation held by the
Neri for introducing Charles of Valois1 might, perhaps, have
justified him in treating that party with yet greater rigour. The
suspicion against him was increased, when those, whom he was
accused of favouring, were soon after allowed to return from their
banishment, while the sentence passed upon the other faction still
remained in full force. To this Dante replied, tkat when those who
had been sent to Serrazana were recalled, he was no longer in oil
and that their return had been permitted on account of the death of
Guido Cavalcanti, which was attributed to the unwholesome air
of that place. The partiality which had been shown, however,
afforded a pretext to the Pope 2 for despatching Charles of Valois to
Florence, by whose influence a great reverse was soon produced in
the public affairs ; the ex-citizens being restored to their place, and
the whole of the Bianca party driven into exile. At this juncture,
Dante was not in Florence, but at Home, whither he had a short
time before been sent ambassador to the Pope, with the offer of
a voluntary return to peace and amity among the citizens. His
enemies had now an opportunity of revenge, and, during li
on -this pacific mission, proceeded to pass an iniquitous decree of
banishment against him and Palmieri Altoviti ; and at the same
time confiscated his possessions, which indeed had been previously
given up to pillage.3

On hearing the tidings of his ruin, Dante instantly quitted Rome,
and passed with all possible expedition to Sienna. Here being more
fully apprized of the extent of the calamity, for which he could see
no remedy, he came to the desperate resolution of joining himself to
the other exiles. His first meeting with them was at a consultation
which they had at Gorgonza, a small castle subject to the jurisdiction of
Arezzo, in which city it was finally, after a long deliberation,

I

1 See Purg. xx. 69.

2 Boniface VIII. had before sent the Cardinal Matteo d'Acquasparta to
Florence, with the view of supporting his own adherents in that city. The
cardinal is supposed to be alluded to in the Paradise, xii. 115.

3 On the 27th of January, 1302, he was mulcted 8000 lire, and condemned to
two years' banishment ; and in case the fine was not paid, his goods were to be
confiscated. On the 16th of March, the same year, he was sentenced to a
punishment due only to the most desperate of malefactors. The decree, that
Dante and his associates in exile should be burned, if they fell into the l}anf1s_aj
of their enemies, was first discovered in 1772, by the Cbnte Lodovico Savioli.
See Tiraboschi, where the document is given

LIFE OF DANTE. . xvii

resolved that they should take up their station.1 Hither they
accordingly repaired in a numerous body, made the Count Alessandro
da Romena their leader, and appointed a council of twelve, of which
number Dante was one. In the year 1304, having been joined by a
very strong force, which was not only furnished them by Arezzo,
but sent from Bologna and Pistoia, they made a sudden attack on
of Florence, gained possession of one of the gates, and con-
quered part of the territory, but were finally compelled to retreat
without retaining any of the advantages they had acquired.

Disappointed in this attempt to reinstate himself in his country,
Dante quitted Arezzo ; and his course is,2 for the most part, after-

1 At Arezzo it was his fortune, in 1302, to meet with Busone da Gubbia, who
two years before had been expelled from his country as a Ghibelline, in about
the twentieth year of his age. Busone, himself a cultivator of the Italian
poetry, here contracted a friendship with Dante, which was afterwards
cemented by the reception afforded him under Busone's roof during a part of
his exile. He was of the ancient and noble family of the Rafaelli of Gubbio ;
and to his banishment owed the honourable offices which he held of governor
of Arezzo in 1316 and 1317 ; of governor of Viterbo in the latter of these years ;
then of captain of Pisa ; of deputy to the Emperor in 1327 ; and finally of
Roman senator in 1337. He died ^rolxtbly about 1350. The historian of
Italian literature speaks lightly of his poetical productions, consisting chiefly
of comments on the Divina Commedia, which were written in terza rima.
They have been published by Sig. Francesco Maria Rafaelli, who has collected
all the information that could be obtained respecting them. Erudilor
v. xvii. He wrote also a romance, entitled L ArrfottiTY'dso Oiciliano, which
has never been printed. Tiraboschi, Stor. dclla Poes. Ital. vol. ii. p. 56. In
Allacci's Collection, ediz. Napoli, 1661, p. 112, is a sonnet by Busone, on the
death of a lady and of Dante, which concludes,

Ma i mi conforto ch' io credo che Deo
Dante abbia posto in glorioso scanno.

At the end of the Divina Commedia, in No. 3581 of the Harleian MSS. in
the British Museum, are four poems. The first, beginning,

0 voi che siete nel verace lume,

is attributed, as usual, to Jacopo Dante. The second, which begins,

Acio che sia piu frutto e phi diletto
A quei che si dilettan di sapere
Dell' alta comedia vero intelletto,

and proceeds with a brief explanation of the principal parts of the poem, is
here attributed to Messer Busone d'Agobbio. It is also inserted in Nos. 3459
and 3460 of the same MSS. ; and I have had occasion to refer to it in the Notes
to Purg. xxix. 140. The third is a sonnet by Cino da Pistoia to Busone ; and
the fourth, Busone's answer. Since this Note was written, Busone's romance,
above mentioned, has been edited at Florence in the year 1832, by the late
Doctor Nott. i^^^2y"

2 A late writer has attempted a recital of his wanderings. For this purpose,

- certain arbitrary dates to the completion of the several parts of the

'ommedia ; and selecting from each what he supposes to be remin-

;oes of particular ] d by Dante, together with allusions to events

then passing, contrives, by the help of some questionable documents, to weave

b

xviii LIFE OF DANTE.

wards to be traced only by notices, casually dropped in liis own
writings, or discovered in documents, which either chance or the
zeal of antiquaries may have brought to light. From an instru-
ment 1 in the possession of the Marchesi Papafavi, of Padua, it has
been ascertained that, in 1306, he was at that city and with that
family. Similar proof2 exists of his having been present in the
following year at a congress of the Ghibellines and the Bianchi, held
in the sacristy of the church belonging to the abbey of S. Gaudenzio
in Mugello ; and from a passage in the Purgatory 3 we collect, that
before the expiration of 1307 he had found a refuge in Lunigiana,
with the Marchese Morello or Marcello Malaspina, who, though
formerly a supporter 4 of the opposite party, was now magnanimous
enough to welcome a noble enemy in his misfortune.

The time at which he sought an asylum at Verona, under the
hospitable roof of the Signori della Scala, is less distinctly marked.
It would seem as if those verses in the Paradise, where the shade of
his ancestor declares to him,

Lo primo tuo rifugio e'l primo ostello
Sara la cortesia del gran Lonibardo,

First5 refuge' thou must find, first place of rest,
In the great Lombard's courtesy,

should not be interpreted too strictly : but whether he experienced
that courtesy at a very early period of his banishment, or, as others
have imagined, not till 1308, when he had quitted the Marchese
Morello, it is believed that he left Verona in disgust at the flippant
levity of that court, or at some slight which he conceived to have
been shown him by his munificent patron Can Grande, on whose
liberality he has passed so high an encomium.6 Supposing the latter
to have been the cause of his departure, it must necessarily be placed
at a date posterior to 1308 ; for Can Grande, though associated with

out of the whole a continued narrative, which, though it may pass for current
with the unwary reader, will not satisfy a more diligent inquirer after the
truth. See Troya's Veltro Allegorico di Dante, Florence, 1826.

1 Millesimo trecentesimo sexto, die vigesimo septimo mensis Augusti, Padue
in contrata Sancti Martini in domo Domine Amate Domini Papafave, prsesent-
ibus Dantino quondam Alligerii de Florentia et nunc stat Padue in contrata
Sancti Laurentii, etc. Pelli, p. 83.

2 Pelli, p. 85, where the document is given.

3 Canto viii. 133.

4 Hell, xxiv. 144. Morello's wife Alagia is honourably mentioned in the
Purg. xix. 140.

5 Canto xvii. 68.

c Hell, i. 98, and Par. xvii. 75. A Latin Epistle dedicatory of the Paradise
to Can Grande is attributed to Dante. Without better proof than has beei
yet adduced, I cannot conclude it to be genuine. See the question discusseq
by Fraticelli, in the Opere Minori di Dante, torn. iii. pte ii. 12°. Fir. 1841.

LIFE OF DANTE. xix

his amiable brother Alboino * in the government of Verona, -was then
only seventeen years of age, and therefore incapable of giving the
alleged offence to his guest.

The mortifications, which he underwent during these wanderings,
will be best described in his own language. In his Convito he
speaks of his banishment, and the poverty and distress which attended
it, in very affecting terms. " Alas," 2 said he, " had it pleased the
Dispenser of the Universe, that the occasion of this excuse had never
existed ; that neither others had committed wrong against me, nor I
suffered unjustly; suffered, I say, the punishment of exile and of poverty;
since it was the pleasure of the citizens of that fairest and most
renowned daughter of Eome, Florence, to cast me forth out of her
sweet bosom, in which I had my birth and nourishment even to the
ripeness of my age ; and in which, with her good will, I desire, with
all my heart, to rest this wearied spirit of mine, and to terminate
the time allotted to me on earth. Wandering over almost every
part, to which this our language extends, I have gone about like a
mendicant ; showing, against my will, the wound with which
fortune has smitten me, and which is often imputed to his ill-
deserving, on whom it is inflicted. I have, indeed, been a vessel
without sail and without steerage, carried about to divers ports, and
roads, and shores, by the dry wind that springs out of sad poverty ;
and have appeared before the eyes of many, who, perhaps, from
some report that had reached them, had imagined me of a different
form ; in whose sight not only my person was disparaged, but every
action of mine became of less value, as well already performed, as
those which yet remained for me to attempt." It is no wonder that,
with feelings like these, he was now willing to obtain by humiliation
and entreaty, what he had before been unable to effect by force.

He addressed several supplicatory epistles, not only to individuals
who composed the government, but to the people at large ; parti-
cularly one letter, of considerable length, which Leonardo Aretino
relates to have begun with this expostulation : " Popule mi, quid
feci tibi?"

"While he anxiously waited the result of these endeavours to
obtain his pardon, a different complexion was given to the face of
public affairs by the exaltation of Henry of Luxemburgh3 to the

1 Alboino is spoken of in the Convito, p. 179, in such a manner, that it is
^pt easy to say whether a compliment or a reflection is intended ; but I am
J^Mclined to think the latter.

•92 " Ahi piacciuto fosse al Dispensatore dell' Universo," etc. p. 11.

w? Par. xvii. SO, and xxx. 141.

XX

LIFE OF DANTE.

imperial throne ; and it was generally expected that the most
important political changes would follow, on the arrival of the new
sovereign in Italy. Another prospect, more suitable to the temper
of Dante, now disclosed itself to his hopes : he once more assumed a
lofty tone of defiance ; and, as it should seem, without much regard
either to consistency or prudence, broke out into bitter invectives
against the rulers of Florence, threatening them with merited
vengeance from the power of the Emperor, which he declared that
they had no adequate means of opposing. He now decidedly relin-
quished the party of the Guelphs, which had been espoused by his
ancestors, and under whose banners he had served in the earlier
part of his life on the plains of Campaldino ; and attached himself
to the cause of their opponents, the Ghibellines. Reverence for his
country, says one of his biographers,1 prevailed on him to absent
himself from the hostile army, when Henry of Luxemburgh en-
camped before the gates of Florence ; but it is difficult to give him
credit for being now much influenced by a principle which had not
formerly been sufficient to restrain him from similar violence. It
is probable that he was actuated by some desire, however weak, of
preserving appearances ; for of his personal courage no question can
be made. Dante was fated to disappointment. The Emperor's
campaign ended in nothing; the Emperor himself died the following
summer (in 1313), at Buonconvento ; and, with him, all hopes of
regaining his native city expired in the breast of the unhappy exile.
Several of his biographers 2 affirm that he now made a second journey
to Paris, where Boccaccio adds that he held a public disputation 3
on various questions of theology. To what other places 4 he might
have roamed during his banishment, is very uncertain. We are
told that he was in Casentino, with the Conte Guido Salvatico,6 at
one time ; and, at another, in the mountains near Urbino, with the
Signori della Faggiola. At the monastery of Santa Croce di Fonte

1 Leonardo Aretino.

2 Benvenuto da Imola, Filippo Villani, and Boccaccio.

3 Another public philosophical disputation at Verona, in 1320, published at
Venice in 1508, seems to be regarded by Tiraboschi with some suspicion of its
authenticity. It is entitled, "Quaestio fiorulenta et perutilis de duobus ele-
mentis aquae et terrae tractans, nuper reperta, quae olim Manture auspicata,
Veronae vero disputata et decisa, ac manu propria scripta a Dante Florentino
Poeta clarissimo, quae diligenter et accurate correcta fuit per Rev. Magistrum
Joan. Benedictum Moncettum de Castilione Aretino Regentem Patavinum
Ordinis Eremitarum Divi Augustini, sacraeque Theologiae Doctorem excellent-
issimum. "

4 Vellutello says that he was also in Germany. Vita del Poeta.

5 He was grandson to the valiant Guidoguerra. Pelli, p. 95. See //. xvi.
38.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxi

Avellana, a wild and solitary retreat in the territory of Gubbio, was
shown a chamber, in which, as a Latin inscription 1 declared, it was
believed that he had composed no small portion of his divine work.
A tower,2 belonging to the Conti Falcucci, in Gubbio, claims for
itself a similar honour. In the castle of Colmollaro, near the river
Saonda, and about six miles from the same city, he was courteously
entertained by Busone da Gubbio,3 whom he had formerly met at

1 Hocce cubiculum hospes

In quo Dantes Aligherius habitasse
In eoque non minimum praeclari ac

Pene divini operis partem com-

posuisse dicitur undique fatiscens

Ac tantum non solo aequatum

Philippus Rodulphius

Laurentii Nicolai Cardinalis

Amplissimi Fratris Filius summus

Collegii Prseses pro eximia erga

Civem suum pietate refici hancque

Illius effigiem ad tanti viri memo-

riam revocandam Antonio Petreio

Canon. Floren. procurante

Collocari mandavit

Kal. Maii. M.D.L.VII. Pelli, p. 98.

2 In this is inscribed,

Hie mansit Dantes

Aleghierius Poeta

Et carmina scripsit. Pelli, p. 97.

3 The following sonnet, said to be addressed to him by Dante, was published
in the Delicice Eruditorum, and is inserted in the Zatta edition of our Poet's
Works, torn. iv. part ii. p. 264, in which alone I have seen it :

Tu, che stampi lo colle ombroso e fresco,

Ch' e co lo Fiume, che non e torrente,

Linci molle lo chiama quella gente

In nome Italiano e non Tedesco :
Ponti, sera e mattin, contento al desco,

Perche del car figliuol vedi presente

El frutto che sperassi, e si repente

S' avaccia nello stil Greco e Francesco.
Perche cima d'ingegno non s'astalla

In quella Italia di dolor ostello,

Di cni si speri gia cotanto frutto ;
Gavazzi pur el primo Raffaello,

Che tra dotti vedrallo esser veduto,

Come sopr' acqua si sostien la galla.

Translation.

Thou, who where Linci sends his stream to drench
The valley, walk'st that fresh and shady hill
(Soft Linci well they call the gentle rill,
Nor smooth Italian name to German wrench)

xxii LIFE OF DANTE.

Arezzo. There are some traces of Lis having made a temporary-
abode at Udine, and particularly of his having been in the Friuli
with Pagano della Torre, the patriarch of Aquileia, at the castle of
Tolmino, where he is also said to have employed himself on the
Divina Commedia, and where a rock was pointed out that was called
the seat of Dante.1 What is known with greater certainty is, that
he at last found a refuge at Ravenna, with Guido Novello da
Polenta ; 2 a splendid protector of learning ; himself a poet ; and
the kinsman of that unfortunate Francesca,3 whose story has been
told by Dante with such unrivalled pathos.

It would appear from one of his Epistles that about the year 1316
he had the option given him of returning to Florence, on the igno-
minious terms of paying a fine, and of making a public avowal of his
offence. It may, perhaps, be in reference to this offer, which, for the
same reason that Socrates refused to save his life on similar conditions,
lie indignantly rejected, that he promises himself he shall one day

return " in other guise,"

and standing up
At his baptismal font, shall claim the wreath
Due to the poet's temples. Piny. xxv.

Evening and morning, seat thee on thy bench,

Content ; beholding fruit of knowledge fill

So early thy son's branches, that grow still

Enrich d with dews of Grecian lore and French.
Though genius, with like hopeful fruitage hung,

Spread not aloft in recreant Italy,

Where grief her home, and worth has made his grave ;
Yet may the elder Raffaello see,

With joy, his offspring seen the learn'd among,

Like buoyant thing that floats above the wave.

1 The considerations which induced the Cavalier Vannetti to conclude that
a part of the Commedia, and the Canzone beginning

Canzon, da che convien pur, ch' io mi doglia,

were written in the valley Lagarina, in the territory of Trento, do not appear
entitled to much notice. Vanuetti's letter is in the Zatta edition of Dante,
torn. iv. part ii. p. 143. There may be better ground for concluding that he
was, sometime during his exile, with Lanteri Paratico, a man of ancient and
noble family, at the castle of Paratico, near Brescia, and that he there em-
ployed himself on his poems. The proof of this rests upon a communication
made by the Abate Rodella to Dionisi, of an extract from a chronicle remain-
ing at Brescia. See Cancellieri, Osservazioni intorno alia questione sopra
Voriginalitl della Divina Commedia, etc. Roma, 1814, p. 125.

2 See Hell, xxvii. 38.

3 Hell, v. 113, and Note. Former biographers of Dante have represented
Guido, his last patron, as the father of Francesca. Troya asserts that he was
her nephew. See his Veltro Allegorico di Dante, ed. Florence, 1826, p. 1/6.
It is to be regretted that, in this instance, as in others, he gives no authority
for his assertion. He is however followed by Balbo, Vita di Dante, Torino,
1839, vol. ii. p. 315 ; and Artaud, Histoire de Dante, Paris, 1841, p. 470.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxiii

Such, indeed, was the glory which his compositions in his native
tongue had now gained him, that he declares, in the treatise Be
Vulgari Eloquential it had in some measure reconciled him even to
his banishment.

In the service of his last patron, in whom he seems to have met
with a more congenial mind than in any of the former, his talents
were gratefully exerted, and his affections interested but too deeply ;
for having been sent by Guido on an embassy to the Venetians, and
not being able even to obtain an audience, on account of the
rancorous animosity with which they regarded that prince, Dante
returned to Eavenna so overwhelmed with disappointment and
grief, that he was seized by an illness which terminated fatally,
either in July or September 1321. 2 Guido testified his sorrow and
respect by the sumptuousness of his obsequies, and by his intention
to erect a monument, which he did not live to complete. His
countrymen showed, too late, that they knew the value of what they
had lost. At the beginning of the next century, their posterity
marked their regret by entreating that the mortal remains of their
illustrious citizen might be restored to them, and deposited among
the tombs of their fathers. But the people of Ravenna were
unwilling to part with the sad and honourable memorial of their
own hospitality. No better success attended the subsequent
negotiations of the Florentines for the same purpose, though re-
newed under the auspices of Leo X., and conducted through the
powerful mediation of Michael Angelo.3

The sepulchre, designed and commenced by Guido da Polenta,
was, in 1483, erected by Bernardo Bembo, the father of the Cardinal ;
and, by him, decorated, besides other ornaments, with an effigy of
the Poet in bas-relief, the sculpture of Pietro Lomhardo, and with
the following epitaph :

Exigua tumuli, Danthes, hie sorte jacebas, -

Squalenti nulli cognite pene situ.
At nunc marmoreo subnixus conderis arcu,

Omnibus et cultu splendidiore nites.
Nimirum Bembus Musis incensus Etruscis

Hoc tibi, quern imprimis haj coluere, dedit.

1 Quantum vero suos familiares gloriosos efficiat, nos ipsi novimus, qui hujus
dulcedine gloria) nostrum exilium postergamus. Lib. 1. cap. xvii.

2 Filippo Villani ; Domenico di Bandino d'Arezzo ; and Giov. Villani, Hist.
lib. 9. cap. exxxv. The last writer, whose authority is perhaps the best on
this point, in the Giunti edition of 1559, mentions July as the month in which
he died ; but there is a MS. of Villani's history, it is said, in the library of St.
Mark at Venice, in which his death is placed in September.

3 Pelli, p. 104.

xxiv LIFE OF DANTE.

A yet more magnificent memorial was raised so lately as the year
1780, by the Cardinal Gonzaga.1

His children consisted of one daughter and five sons, two of whom,
Pietro 2 and Jacopo,3 inherited some portion of their father's abilities,
which they employed chiefly in the pious task of illustrating his
.Divina Commedia. The former of these possessed acquirements of
a more profitable kind ; and obtained considerable wealth at Verona,
where he was settled, by the exercise of the legal profession. He
was honoured with the friendship of Petrarch, by whom some verses
were addressed to him 4 at Trevigi, in 1361.

His daughter Beatrice6 (whom he is said to have named after
the daughter of Folco Portinari) became a nun in the convent of

1 Tiraboscki.

In the Literary Journal, Feb. 16, 1804, p. 192, is the following article : —
"A subscription has been opened at Florence for erecting a monument in the
cathedral there, to the memory of the great poet Dante. A drawing of this
monument has been submitted to the Florentine Academy of the Fine Arts,
and has met with universal approbation." A monument, executed by Stefano
Ricci of Arezzo, has since been erected to him in the Santa Croce at Florence,
which I had the gratification of seeing in the year 1833.

2 Pietro was also a poet. His commentary on the Divina Commedia, which
is in Latin, has never been published. Lionardo, the grandson of Pietro, came
to Florence, with other young men of Verona, in the time of Leonardo Aretino,
who tells us, that he showed him there the house of Dante and of his ancestors.
Vita di Dante. To Pietro, the son of Lionardo, Mario Filelfo addressed his Life
of our Poet. The son of this Pietro, Dante III., was a man of letters, and an
elegant poet. Some of his works are preserved in collections : he is com-
mended by Valerianus, De Infelicitate Literat. lib. 1., and is, no doubt, the same
whom Landino speaks of as living in his time at Ravenna, and calls "uomo
molto literato ed eloquente e degno di tal sangue, e quale meritamente si
dovrebbe rivocar nella sua antica patria e nostra republica." In 1495, the
Florentines took Landino's advice, and invited him back to the city, oifering
to restore all they could of the property that had belonged to his ancestors ;
but he would not quit Verona, where he was established in much opulence.
Vellutello, Vita. He afterwards experienced a sad reverse of fortune. He had
three sons, one of whom, Francesco, made a translation of Vitruvius, which is
supposed to have perished. A better fate has befallen an elegant dialogue
written by him, which was published, not many years ago, in the Anecdota
Literaria, edit. Roma (no date), vol. ii. p. 207. It is entitled Francisci Aligerii
Dantis III. Filii Dialogus Alter de Antiquitatibus Valentinis ex Cod. MS.
Membranaceo. Saec. xvi. nunc primum in lucem editus. Pietro, another son of
Dante III., who was also a scholar, and held the office of Proveditore of Verona
in 1539, was the father of Ginevra, mentioned above in the Note to p. xi. See
Pelli, p. 28, etc. Vellutello, in his Life of the Poet, acknowledges his obliga-
tions to this last Pietro for the information he had given him.

3 Jacopo is mentioned by Bembo among the Rimatori, lib. 2. Delia Volg.
Ling, at the beginning ; and some of his verses are preserved in MS. in the
Vatican, and at Florence. He was living in 1342, and had children, of whom little
is known. The names of our Poet's other sons were Gabriello, Aligero, and
Eliseo. The last two died in their childhood. Of Gabriello, nothing certain is
known.

4 Carm. lib. 3. ep. vii.

5 Pelli, p. 33.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxv

S. Stefano dell' Uliva, at Ravenna ; and, among the entries of ex-
penditure Ly the Florentine Republic, appears a present of ten
golden florens sent to her in 1350, by the hands of Boccaccio, from
the state. The imagination can picture to itself few objects more
interesting, than the daughter of Dante, dedicated to the service of
religion in the city where her father's ashes were deposited, and
receiving from his countrymen this tardy tribute of their reverence
for his divine genius, and her own virtues.

It is but justice to the wife of Dante not to omit what Boccaccio l
relates of her ; that after the banishment of her husband she secured
some share of his property from the popular fury, under the name
of her dowry ; that out of this she contrived to support their little
family with exemplary discretion ; and that she even removed from
them the pressure of poverty, by such industrious efforts as in her
former affluence she had never been called on to exert. Who does
not regret, that with qualities so estimable, she wanted the sweetness
of temper necessary for riveting the affections of her husband 1

Dante was a man of middle stature and grave deportment ; of a
visage rather long ; large eyes ; an aquiline nose ; dark complexion ;
large and prominent cheek-bones ; black curling hair and beard ;
the under lip projecting beyond the upper. He mentions, in the
Convito, that his sight had been transiently impaired by intense
application to books.2 In his dress, he studied as much plainness as
was suitable with his rank and station in life ; and observed a strict
temperance in his diet. He was at times extremely absent and
abstracted ; and appears to have indulged too much a disposition to
sarcasm. At the table of Can Grande, when the company was
amused by the conversation and tricks of a buffoon, he was asked by
his patron, why Can Grande himself, and the guests who were
present, failed of receiving as much pleasure from the exertion of
his talents, as this man had been able to give them. " Because all
creatures delight in their own resemblance," was the reply of Dante. 3

1 Vita di Dante, p. 57, ed. Firenze, 1576.

" " Per affaticare lo viso molto a studio di leggere, intanto debilitai gli spiriti
visivi, che le stelle mi pareano tutte d'alcuno albore ombrate : e per lunga
riposanza in luoghi scuri, e freddi, e con affreddare lo corpo dell' occhio con
acqua pura, rivinsi la virtu disgregata, che tornai nel prima buono stato della
vista." Convito, p. 108.

3 There is here a point of resemblance (nor is it the only one) in the character
of Milton. " I had rather," says the author of Paradise Lost, " since the life
of man is likened to a scene, that all my entrances and exits might mix with
such persons only, whose worth erects them and their actions to a grave and
tragic deportment, and not to have to do with clowns and vices." Colasterion,
Prose Works, vol. i. p. 339, edit. London, 1753.

xxvi LIFE OF DANTE.

In other respects, his manners are said to have been dignified and

polite. He was particularly careful not to make any approaches to

flattery, a vice which he justly held in the utmost abhorrence. He

spoke seldom, and in a slow voice ; but what he said derived authority

from the subtileness of his observations, somewhat like his own

poetical heroes, who

Parlavan rado con voci soavi.

spake

Seldom, but all their words were tuneful sweet.

Hell, iv.

He was connected in habits of intimacy and friendship with the most
ingenious men of his time ; with Guido Cavalcanti ; 1 with Buon-
aggiunta da Lucca ; 2 with Forese Donati ; 3 with Cino da Pistoia ; -
with Giotto,5 the celebrated painter, by whose hand his likeness G

1 See Hell, x. and Notes.

2 See Purg. xxiv. Yet Tiraboschi observes, that though it is not improbable
that Buonaggiunta was the contemporary and friend of Dante, it cannot l>e
considered as certain. Stor. della Poes. Ital. torn. i. p. 109, Mr. Mathias's
edit.

3 See Purg. xxiii. 44.

4 Guittorino de' Sigibuldi, commonly called Cino da Pistoia, (besides the
passage that will be cited in a following note from the De Vulg. Eloij.,) is
again spoken of in the same treatise, lib. 1. cap. xvii., as a great master of the
vernacular diction in his Cauzoni, and classed with our Poet himself, who is
termed " Amicus ejus ; " and likewise in lib. 2. cap. ii., where he is said to have
written of " Love." His verses are cited too in other chapters. He addressed
and received sonnets from Dante ; and wrote a sonnet, or canzone, on Dante's
death, which is preserved in the library of St. Mark at Venice. Tiraboschi,
Della Poes. Ital. vol. i. p. 116, and vol. ii. p. 60. The same honour was done to
the memory of Cino by Petrarch, son. 71, part i. "Celebrated both as a
lawyer and a poet, he is better known by the writings which lie hits left in
the latter of these characters," insomuch that Tiraboschi has observed, that
amongst those who preceded Petrarch, there is, perhaps, none who can be
compared to him in elegance and sweetness. " There are many editions of his
poems, the most copious being that published at Venice in 1589, by P. Faustino
Tasso ; in which, however, the Padre degli Agostini, not without reason,
suspects that the second book is by later hands." Tiraboschi, ibid. There
has been an edition by Seb. Ciampi, at Pisa, in 1813, etc. ; but see the remarks
on it in Gamba's Testi di Lingua Ital. 294. He was interred at Pistoia, with
this epitaph : "Cino eximio Juris intcrpreti Bartolique praeceptori dignissimo
populus Pistoriensis Civi suo B. M. fecit. Obiit anno 1336." Guidi Panzir<>!i
de Claris Legum Interpretibus, lib. 2. cap. xxix. Lips. 4to, 1721. A Latin
letter supposed to be addressed by Dante to Cino was published for the first
time from a MS. in the Laurentian library, by M. Witte.

5 See Purg. xi.

6 Mr. Eastlake, in a note to Kugler's Hand-Book of Painting, translated by
a Lady, Lond. 1842, p. 50, describes the discovery and restoration, in July
1840, of Dante's portrait by Giotto in the chapel of the Podesta at Florence,
where it had been covered with whitewash or plaster. But it could scarcely
have been concealed so soon as our distinguished artist supposes, since Landino
speaks of it as remaining in his time, and Vasari says it was still to be seen
when he wrote.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxvii

was preserved ; with Oderigi da Gubbio,1 the illuminator ; and with
an eminent musician 2 —

his Casella, whom he wooed to sing,

Met in the milder shades of Purgatory. Milton's Sonnets.

Besides these, his acquaintance extended to some others, whose
names illustrate the first dawn of Italian literature. Lapo 3 degli
Uberti ; Dante da Majano ; 4 Cecco Angliolieri ; 5 Dino Fresco-
baldi ; G Giovanni di Virgilio ; 7 Giovanni Quirino ; 8 and Francesco

1 See Purg. xi.

2 Ibid. Canto ii.

3 Lapo is said to have been the son of Farinata degli Uberti, (see Hell, x. 32,
and Tiraboschi, Delia Poes. ltal. vol. i. p. 116,) and the father of Fazio degli
Uberti, author of the Dittamondo, a poem, which is thought, in the energy of
its style, to make some approaches to theDivina Commedia, (Ibid. vol. ii. p. 63,)
though Monti passes on it a much less favourable sentence (see his Proposta,
vol. iii. pte ii. p. ccx. 8vo, 1824). He is probably the Lapo mentioned in the
sonnet to Guido Cavalcanti, beginning,

Guido vorrei che tu e Lapo ed io,
which Mr. Hayley has so happily translated (see Hell, x. 62) ; and also in a
passage that occurs in the Be Vulg. Eloq. vol. i. p. 116: " Quanquam fere
omnes Tusci in suo turpiloquio sint obtusi, nonnullos Vulgaris excellentiam
cognovisse sentimus, scilicet Guidonem Lapum, et unum alium, Florentinos,
et Cinum Pistoriensem, quern nunc indigne postponimus, non indigne coacti."
" Although almost all the Tuscans are marred by the baseness of their dialect,
yet I perceive that some have known the excellence of the vernacular tongue,
namely Guido Lapo," (I suspect Dante here means his two friends Cavalcanti
and Uberti, though this has hitherto been taken for the name of one person,)
" and one other," (who is supposed to be the Author himself,) "Florentines ;
and last, though not of least regard, Cino da Pistoia."

4 Dante da Majano flourished about 1290. He was a Florentine, and com-
posed many poems in praise of a Sicilian lady, who, being herself a poetess,
was insensible neither to his verses nor his love, so that she was called the
Nina of Dante. Pelli, p. 60, and Tiraboschi, Storia delict Poes. Ital. vol. i. p.
137. There a.-o several of his sonnets addressed to our Poet, who declares, in
his answer to one of them, that, although he knows not the name of its author,
he discovers in it the traces of a great mind.

5 Of Cecco Angiolieri, Boccaccio relates a pleasant story in the Decameron,
G. ix. N. 4. He lived towards the end of the thirteenth century, and wrote
several sonnets to Dante, which are in Allacci's collection. In some of them
he wears the semblance of a friend ; but in one the mask drops, and shows
that he was well disposed to be a rival. See Crescimbeni, Com. alia Storia di
Volg. Poes. vol. ii. par. ii. lib. 2. p. 103 ; Pelli, p. 61.

6 Dino, son of Lambertuccio Frescobaldi. Crescimbeni (ibid. lib. 3. p.
120) assures us that he was not inferior to Cino da Pistoia. Pelli, p. 61. He
is said to have been a friend of Dante's, in whose writings I have not observed
any mention of him. Boccaccio, in his Life of Dante, calls Dino "in que'
tempi famosissimo dicitore in rima in Firenze."

7 Giovanni di Virgilio addressed two Latin eclogues to Dante, which were
answered in similar compositions ; and is said to have been his friend and
admirer. See Boccaccio, Vita di Dante ; and Pelli, p. 137. Dante's poetical
genius sometimes breaks through the rudeness of style in his two Latin
eclogues.

8 Muratori had seen several sonnets, addressed to Giovanni Quirino by
Dante, in a MS. preserved in the Ambrosian library. Delia Perfetta Poesia
Ital. ediz. Venezia, 1770, torn. i. lib. 1. cap. iii. p. 9.

xxviii LIFE OF DANTE.

Stabili,1 who is better known by the appellation of Cecco d'Ascoli ;
most of them either honestly declared their sense of his superiority,
or betrayed it by their vain endeavours to detract from the estimation
in which he was held.

He is said to have attained some excellence in the art of
designing ; which may easily be believed, when we consider that
no poet has afforded more lessons to the statuary and the painter,2
in the variety of objects which he represents, and in the accuracy
and spirit with which they are brought before the eye. Indeed, on
one occasion,3 he mentions that lie was employed in delineating the
figure of an angel, on the first anniversary of Beatrice's death. It
is not unlikely that the seed of the Paradiso was thus cast into his
mind ; and that he was now endeavouring to express by the pencil
an idea of celestial beatitude, which could only be conveyed in its
full perfection through the medium of song.

As nothing that related to such a man was thought unworthy of
notice, one of his biographers,4 who had seen his handwriting, has
recorded that it was of a long and delicate character, and remarkable
for neatness and accuracy.

Dante wrote in Latin a treatise De Monarchid, and two books De
Vulgari Eloquio.5 In the former, he defends the Imperial rights

1 For the correction of many errors respecting this writer, see Tiraboschi,
Stor. della Lett. Ital. torn. v. lib. 2. cap. ii. sec. 15, etc. He was burned in
1317. In his Acerba, a poem in sesta rima, he has taken several occasions of
venting his spleen against his great contemporary.

2 Besides Filippo Brunelleschi, who, as Vasari tells us, diede molta opera
alle cose di Dante, and Michael Augelo, whose Last Judgment is probably the
mightiest effort of modern art, as the loss of his sketches on the margin of the
Divina Commedia may be regarded as the severest loss the art has sustained ;
besides these, Andrea Orgagna, Gio. Angelico di Fiesole, Luca Signorelli,
Spinello Aretino, Giacomo da Pontormo, and Aurelio Lomi, have been
recounted among the many artists who have worked on the same original.
See Cancellieri, Osservationi, etc. p. 75. To these we may justly pride
ourselves in being able to add the names of Reynolds, Fuseli, and Flaxman.
The frescoes by Cornelius in the Villa Massimi at Rome, lately executed,
entitle the Germans to a share in this distinction.

3 "In quel giorno, nel quale si compieva l'anno, che questa donna era fatta
delle cittadine di vita eterna, io mi sedeva in parte, nella quale, ricordandomi
di lei, io disegnava uno Angelo sopra certe tavolette, e mentre io il disegnava,
volsi gli occhi," etc. Vita Nuova, p. 268.

4 Leonardo Aretino. A specimen of it was believed to exist when Pelli
wrote, about sixty years ago, and perhaps still exists in a MS. preserved in
the archives at Gubbio, at the end of which was the sonnet to Busone, said to
be in the handwriting of Dante. Pelli, p. 51.

6 These two were first published in an Italian translation, supposed to be
Trissino's, and were not allowed to be genuine, till the Latin original was
published at Paris in 1577. Tiraboschi. A copy, written in the fourteenth
century, is said to have been lately found in the public library at Grenoble.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxix

against the pretensions of the Pope, with arguments that are some-
times chimerical, and sometimes sound and conclusive. The latter,
which he left unfinished, contains not only much information
concerning the progress which the vernacular poetry of Italy
had then made, but some reflections on the art itself, that prove
him to have entertained large and philosophical principles respect-
ing it.

His Latin style, however, is generally rude and unclassical. It is
fortunate that he did not trust to it, as he once intended, for the
work by which his name was to be perpetuated. In the use of his
own language he was, beyond measure, more successful. The prose
of his Vita Nuova and his Convito, although five centuries have
intervened since its composition, is probably, to an Italian eye,
still devoid neither of freshness nor elegance. In the Vita Nuova,
which he appears to have written about his twenty-eighth year, he
gives an account of his youthful attachment to Beatrice. It is,
according to the taste of those times, somewhat mystical : yet there
are some particulars in it, which have not at all the air of a fiction,
such as the death of Beatrice's father, Folco Portinari ; her relation
to the friend whom he esteemed next after Guido Cavalcanti ; his
own attempt to conceal his passion, by a pretended attachment to
another lady ; and the anguish he felt at the death of his mistress.1
He tells us too, that at the time of her decease, lie chanced to
be composing a canzone in her praise, and that he was inter-
rupted by that event at the conclusion of the first stanza ; a
circumstance which -we can scarcely suppose to have been a mere
invention.

Of the poetry, with which the Vita Nuova is plentifully inter-
spersed, the two sonnets that follow may be taken as a specimen.
Near the beginning he relates a marvellous vision, which appeared
to him in sleep, soon after his mistress had for the first time
addressed her speech to him ; and of this dream he thus asks for an
interpretation : —

To every heart that feels the gentle flame,
To whom this present saying comes in sight,
In that to me their thoughts they may indite,
All health ! in Love, our lord and master's name.

See Fraticelli's Opere minori di Dante, 12°. Fir. 1840, vol. iii. pte ii. p. xvi.
A collation of this MS. is very desirable.

1 Beatrice's marriage to Simone de' Bardi, which is collected from a clause
in her father's will dated January 15, 1287, would have been a fact too
unsentimental to be introduced into the Vita Nuova, and is not, I believe,
noticed by any of the early biographers.

xxx LIFE OF DANTE.

Now on its way the second quarter came

Of those twelve hours, wherein the stars are bright,
When Love was seen before me, in such might,
As to remember shakes with awe my frame.

Suddenly came he, seeming glad, and keeping
My heart in hand ; and in his arms he had
My Lady in a folded garment sleeping :

He waked her ; and that heart all burning bade
Her feed upon, in lowly guise and sad :
Then from my view he turned ; and parted, weeping.

To this sonnet, Guido Cavalcanti, amongst others, returned an
answer in a composition of the same form ; endeavouring to give a
happy turn to the dream, by which the mind of the Poet had been
so deeply impressed. From the intercourse thus begun, when Dante
was eighteen years of age, arose that friendship which terminated
only with the death of Guido.

The other sonnet is one that was written after the death of
Beatrice : —

Ah pilgrims ! ye that, haply musing, go,

On aught save that which on your road ye meet,
From land so distant, tell me, I intreat,
Come ye, as by your mien and looks ye show ?

Why mourn ye not, as through these gates of woe
Ye wend along our city's midmost street,
Even like those who nothing seem to weet
What chance hath fall'n, why she is grieving so?

If ye to listen but a while would stay,
Well knows this heart, which inly sigheth sore.
That ye would then pass, weeping on your way.

Oh hear : her Beatrice is no more ;
And words there are a man of her might say,
Would make a stranger's eye that loss deplore.

In the Convito,1 or Banquet, which did not follow till some time
after his "banishment, he explains very much at large the sense of
three, out of fourteen, of his canzoni, the remainder of which he had
intended to open in the same manner. " The viands at his Banquet,"
he tells his readers, quaintly enough, " will be set out in fourteen
different manners ; that is, will consist of fourteen canzoni, the
materials of which are love and virtue. "Without the present bread,
they would not be free from some shade of obscurity, so as to be
prized by many less for their usefulness than for their beauty ; but
the bread will, in the form of the present exposition, be that light,

1 Perticari (Degli Scrittori del trecento, lib. 2. cap. v.) speaking of the Convito,
observes that Salviati himself has termed it the most ancient and principal of
all excellent prose works in Italian. On the other hand, Balbo ( Vita di Dante,
vol. ii. p. 86) pronounces it to be, on the whole, certainly the lowest among
Dante's writings. In this difference of opinion, a foreigner may be permitted
to judge for himself.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxxi

which will bring forth all their colours, and display their true
meaning to the view. And if the present work, which is named a
J la nquet, and I wish may prove so, be handled after a more manly
guise than the Vita Nuova, I intend not, therefore, that the former
should in any part derogate from the latter, but that the one should
be a help to the other : seeing that it is fitting in reason for this to
be fervid and impassioned ; that, temperate and manly. For it
becomes us to act and speak otherwise at one age than at another ;
since at one age, certain manners are suitable and praise- worthy,
which, at another, become disproportionate and blameable." He
then apologizes for speaking of himself. " I fear the disgrace," says
he, " of having been subject to so much passion, as one, reading these
canzoni, may conceive me to have been ; a disgrace, that is removed
by my speaking thus unreservedly of myself, which shows not
passion, but virtue, to have been the moving cause. I intend, more-
over, to set forth their true meaning, which some may not perceive,
if I declare it not." He next proceeds to give many reasons why his
commentary was not written rather in Latin than in Italian ; for
which, if no excuse be now thought necessary, it must be recollected
that the Italian language was then in its infancy, and scarce supposed
to possess dignity enough for the purposes of instruction. "The
Latin," he allows, "would have explained his canzoni better to
foreigners, as to the Germans, the English, and others ; but then it
must have expounded their sense, without the power of, at the same
time, transferring their beauty : " and he soon after tells us, that
many noble persons of both sexes were ignorant of the learned
language. The best cause, however, which he assigns for this prefer-
ence, was his natural love of his native tongue, and the desire he felt
to exalt it above the Provencal, which by many was said to be the
more beautiful and perfect language ; and against such of his country-
men as maintained so unpatriotic an opinion he inveighs with much
warmth.

In his exposition of the first canzone of the three, he tells his
reader, that "the Lady, of whom he was enamoured after his first
love, was the most beauteous and honourable daughter of the
Emperor of the universe, to whom Pythagoras gave the name of
Philosophy : " and he applies the same title to the object of his
affections, when he is commenting on the other two.

The purport of his third canzone, which is less mysterious, and,
therefore, perhaps more likely to please than the others, is to show
that " virtue only is true nobility." Towards the conclusion, after

xxxii LIFE OF DANTE.

having spoken of virtue itself, much as Pindar would have spoken of
it, as being " the gift of God only ; "

Che solo Iddio all' anima la dona,
he thus describes it as acting throughout the several stages of life.

L' anima, cui adorna, etc.

The soul, that goodness like to this adorns,

Holdeth it not conceal'd ;

But, from her first espousal to the frame,

Shows it, till death, reveal'd.

Obedient, sweet, and full of seemly shame,

She, in the primal age,

The person decks with beauty ; moulding it

Fitly through every part.

In riper manhood, temperate, firm of heart,

With love replenish'd, and with courteous praise,

In loyal deeds alone she hath delight.

And, in her elder days,

For prudent and just largeness is she known ;

Kejoicing with herself,

That wisdom in her staid discourse be shown.

Then, in life's fourth division, at the last

She weds with God again,

Contemplating the end she shall attain ;

And looketh back ; and blesseth the time past.

His lyric poems, indeed, generally stand mucli in need of a com-
ment to explain them ; but the difficulty arises rather from the
thoughts themselves, than from any imperfection of the language in
which those thoughts are conveyed. Yet they abound not only in
deep moral reflections, but in touches of tenderness and passion.

Some, it has been already intimated, have supposed that Beatrice
was only a creature of Dante's imagination ; and there can be no
question but that he has invested her, in the Divina Commedia, with
the attributes of an allegorical being. But who can doubt of her
having had a real existence, when she is spoken of in such a strain
of passion as in these lines ?

Quel ch' ella par, quando un poco sorride,

Non si puo dicer ne tenere a mente,

Si e nuovo miracolo e gentile. Vita Nuova.

Mira che quando ride

Passa ben di dolcezza ogni altra cosa. Canz. xv.

The canzone, from which the last couplet is taken, presents a
portrait which might well supply a painter with a far more exalted
idea of female beauty, than he could form to himself from the
celebrated Ode of Anacreon on a similar subject. After a minute
description of those parts of her form, which the garments of a
modest woman would suffer to be seen, he raises the whole by the

LIFE OF DANTE. xxxiii

superadd ition of a moral grace and dignity, such as the Christian
religion alone could supply, and such as the pencil of Raphael after-
wards aimed to represent.

Umile vergognosa e temperata,
E sempre a vertu grata,
Intra suoi be' costumi un atto regna,
Che d' ogni riverenza la fa degna.1

One or two of the sonnets prove that he could at times condescend
to sportiveness and pleasantry. The following to Brunetto, I should
conjecture to have been sent with his Vita Nuova, which was written
the year before Brunetto died.

2 Master Brunetto, this I send, entreating
Ye'll entertain this lass of mine at Easter ;
She does not come among you as a feaster ;
No : she has need of reading, not of eating.

Nor let her find you at some merry meeting,
Laughing amidst buffoons and drollers, lest her
Wise sentence should escape a noisy jester :
She must be wooed, and is well worth the weeting.

If in this sort you fail to make her out,
You have amongst you many sapient men,
All famous as was Albert of Cologne.

I have been posed amid that learned rout.
And if they cannot spell her right, why then
Call Master Giano, and the deed is done.

Another, though on a more serious subject, is yet remarkable for
a fancifulness, such as that with which Chaucer, by a few spirited
touches, often conveys to us images more striking than others have
done by repeated and elaborate efforts of skill.

Came Melancholy to my side one day,
And said : " I must a little bide with thee : "
And brought along with her in company
Sorrow and Wrath. — Quoth I to her ; " Away :

I will have none of you : make no delay."
And, like a Greek, she gave me stout reply.
Then, as she talk'd, I look'd and did espy
Where Love was coming onward on the way,

1 1 am aware that this canzone is not ascribed to Dante, in the collection of
Sonetti e Canzoni printed by the Giunti in 1527. Monti, in his Proposta under
the word " Induare," remarks that it is quite in the style of Fazio degli Uberti ;
and adds, that a very rare MS. possessed by Perticari restores it to that writer.
On the other hand, Missirini, in a late treatise " On the Love of Dante and on
the Portrait of Beatrice," printed at Florence in 1832, makes so little doubt of
its being genuine, that he founds, on it the chief argument to prove an old
picture in his possession to be intended for a representation of Beatrice. See
Fraticelli's Opere Minori di Dante, torn. i. p. cciii. 12°. Fir. 1834.

2 Fraticelli {Ibid. p. cccii. ccciii.) questions the genuineness of this sonnet,
and decides on the spuriousness of that which follows. I do not, in either
instance, feel the justness of his reasons.

c

xxxiv LIFE OF DANTE.

A garment new of cloth of black lie had,
And on his head a hat of mourning wore ;
And he, of truth, unfeignedly was crying.

Forthwith I ask'd : "What ails thee, caitiff lad ? "
And he rejoin'd : " Sad thought and anguish sore,
Sweet brother mine ! our lady lies a-dying."

For purity of diction, the Rime of our author are, I think, on the
whole, preferred by Muratori to his Divina Commedia^ though that
also is allowed to be a model of the pure Tuscan idiom. To this
singular production, which has not only stood the test of ages, but
given a tone and colour to the poetry of modern Europe, and even
animated the genius of Milton and of Michael Angelo, it would be
difficult to assign its place according to the received rules of criticism.
Some have termed it an epic poem ; and others, a satire : hut it
matters little by what name it is called. It suffices that the poem
seizes on the heart by its two great holds, terror and pity ; detains
the fancy by an accurate and lively delineation of the objects it
represents ; and displays throughout such an originality of con-
ception, as leaves to Homer and Shakspeare alone the power of
challenging the pre-eminence or equality.1 The fiction, it has been

1 Yet his pretensions to originality have not been wholly unquestioned.
Dante, it has been supposed, was more immediately influenced in his choice of
a subject by the Vision of Alberico, written in barbarous Latin prose about the
beginning of the twelfth century. The incident, which is said to have given
birth to this composition, is not a little marvellous. Alberico, the son of noble
parents, and born at a castle in the neighbourhood of Alvito in the diocese of
Sora, in the year 1101 or soon after, when he had completed his ninth year, was
seized with a violent fit of illness, which deprived him of his senses for the
space of nine days. During the continuance of this trance, he had a vision, in
which he seemed to himself to be carried away by a dove, and conducted by
St. Peter, in company with two angels, through Purgatory and Hell, to survey
the torments of sinners ; the saint giving him information, as they proceeded,
respecting what he saw : after which they were transported together through
the seven heavens, and taken up into Paradise, to behold the glory of the
blessed. As soon as he came to himself agaiu, he was permitted to make pro-
fession of a religious life in the monastery of Monte Casino. As the account ho
gave of his vision was strangely altered in the reports that went abroad of it,
Girardo the abbot employed one of the monks to take down a relation of it,
dictated by the mouth of Alberico himself. Senioretto, who was chosen abbot
in 1127, not contented with this narrative, although it seemed to have every
chance of being authentic, ordered Alberico to revise and correct it, which he
accordingly did with the assistance of Pietro Diacono, who was his associate in
the monastery, and a few years younger than himself ; and whose testimony to
his extreme and perpetual self-mortification, and to a certain abstractedness of
demeanour, which showed him to converse with other thoughts than those of
this life, is still on record. The time of Alberico's death is not known ; but it
is conjectured that he reached to a good old age. His Vision, with a preface
by the first editor Guido, and preceded by a letter from Alberico himself, is
preserved in a MS. numbered 257 in the archives of the monastery, which con-
tains the works of Pietro Diacono, and which was written between the years

LIFE OF DANTE. xxxv

remarked,1 is admirable, and the work of an inventive talent truly-
great. It comprises a description of the heavens and heavenly bodies ;
a description of men, their deserts and punishments, of supreme
happiness and utter misery, and of the middle state between the two
extremes : nor, perhaps, was there ever anyone who chose a more ample
and fertile subject ; so as to afford scope for the expression of all his
ideas, from the vast multitude of spirits that are introduced speaking
on such different topics ; who are of so many different countries and
ages, and under circumstances of fortune so striking and so diversi-
fied ; and who succeed, one to another, with such a rapidity as never
suffers the attention for an instant to pall.

1159 and 1181. The probability of our Poet's having been indebted to \t, was
first remarked either by Giovanni Bottari in a letter inserted in the Deca di
Simboli, and printed at Rome in 1753 ; or, as F. Cancellieri conjectures, in the
preceding year, by Alessio Simmaco Mazzocchi. In 1801, extracts from
Alberico's Vision were laid before the public in a quarto pamphlet, printed at
Rome with the title of Lettera di Eustazio Dicearcheo ad Angelio Sidicino,
under which appellations the writer, Giustino di Costanzo, concealed his own
name and that of his friend Luigi Anton. Sompano ; and the whole has since,
in 1814, been edited in the same city by Francesco Cancellieri, who has added
to the original an Italian translation. Such parts of it, as bear a marked
resemblance to passages in the Divina Commedia, will be found distributed in
their proper places throughout the following notes. The reader will in these
probably see enough to convince him that our author had read this singular
work, although nothing to detract from his claim to originality.

Long before the public notice had been directed to this supposed imitation,
Malatesta Porta, in the Dialogue entitled Rossi, as referred to by Fontanini in
his Eloquenza Italiana, had suggested the probability that Dante had taken his
plan from an ancient romance, called Guerrino di Durazzo il Meschino.
The above-mentioned Bottari, however, adduced reasons for concluding that
this book was written originally in Provencal, and not translated into Italian
till after the time of our Poet, by one Andrea di Barberino, who embellished it
with many images, and particularly with similes, borroAved from the Divina
Commedia.

Mr. Warton, in one part of his History of English Poetry, (vol. i. s. xviii.
p. 463,) has observed, that a poem, entitled Le Voye an le Songe d'Enfer, was
written by Raoul de Houdane, about the year 1180 ; and in another part (vol.
ii. s. x. p. 219) he has attributed the origin of Dante's Poem to that "favourite
apologue, the Somnium Scipionis of Cicero, which, in Chaucer's words, treats

of heaven and hell
And yearth and souls that therein dwell."

Assemble of Foides.

It is likely that a little research might discover many other sources, from
which his invention might with an equal appearance of truth be derived. The
method of conveying instruction or entertainment under the form of a vision,
in which the living should be made to converse with the dead, was so obvious,
that it would be, perhaps, difficult to mention any country in which it had not
been employed. It is the scale of magnificence on which this conception was
framed, and the wonderful development of it in all its parts, that may justly
entitle our Poet to rank among the few minds, to whom the power of a great
creative faculty can be ascribed.

1 Leonardo Aretino, Vita di Dante.

xxxvi LIFE OF DANTE.

His solicitude, it is true, to define all his images in such a manner
as to bring them distinctly within the circle of our vision, and to
subject them to the power of the pencil, sometimes renders him
little better than grotesque, where Milton has since taught us to
expect sublimity. But his faults, in general, were less those of the
poet, than of the age in which he lived. For his having adopted the
popular creed in all its extravagance, we have no more right to
blame him, than we should have to blame Homer because he made
use of the heathen deities, or Shakspeare on account of his witches
and fairies. The supposed influence of the stars, on the disposition
of men at their nativity, was hardly separable from the distribution
which he had made of the glorified spirits through the heavenly
bodies, as the abodes of bliss suited to their several endowments.
And whatever philosophers may think of the matter, it is certainly
much better, for the ends of poetry at least, that too much should be
believed, rather than less, or even no more than can be proved to be
true. Of what he considered the cause of civil and religious liberty,
he is on all occasions the zealous and fearless advocate ; and of that
higher freedom, which is seated in the will, he was an assertor
equally strenuous and enlightened. The contemporary of Thomas
Aquinas, it is not to be wondered if he has given his poem a tincture
of the scholastic theology, which the writings of that extraordinary
man had rendered so prevalent, and without which it could not
perhaps have been made acceptable to the generality of his readers.
The phraseology has been accused of being at times hard and
uncouth ; but, if this is acknowledged, yet it must be remembered
that he gave a permanent stamp and character to the language in
•which he wrote, and in which, before him, nothing great had been
attempted ; that the diction is strictly vernacular, without any debase-
ment of foreign idiom ; that his numbers have as much variety as
the Italian tongue, at least in that kind of metre, could supply;
and that, although succeeding writers may have surpassed him in the
lighter graces and embellishments of style, not one of them has
equalled him in succinctness, vivacity, and strength.

Never did any poem rise so suddenly into notice after the death
of its author, or engage the public attention more powerfully, than
the Divina Commedia. This cannot be attributed solely to its
intrinsic excellence. The freedom with which the writer had
treated the most distinguished characters of his time, gave it a
further and stronger hold on the curiosity of the age : many saw in
it their acquaintances, kinsmen, and friends, or, what scarcely

LIFE OF DANTE. xxxvii

touched them less nearly, their enemies, either consigned to infamy
or recorded with honour, and represented in another world as
tasting

Of heaven's sweet cup, or poisonous drug of hell ;

so that not a page could be opened without exciting the strongest
personal feelings in the mind of the reader. These sources of
interest must certainly be taken into our account, when we consider
the rapid diffusion of the work, and the unexampled pains that were
taken to render it universally intelligible. Not only the profound
and subtile allegory which pervaded it, the mysterious style of
prophecy which the writer occasionally assumed, the bold and
unusual metaphors which he everywhere employed, and the great
variety of knowledge he displayed ; but his hasty allusions to
passing events, and his description of persons by accidental cir-
cumstances, such as some peculiarity of form or feature, the place of
their nativity or abode, some office they held, or the heraldic insignia
they bore — all asked for the help of commentators and exr>ounders,
who were not long wanting to the task. Besides his two sons, to
whom that labour most properly belonged, many others were found
ready to engage in it. Before the century had expired, there
appeared the commentaries of Accorso de' Bonfantini,1 a Franciscan ;
of Micchino da Mezzano, a canon of Ravenna ; of Fra. Riccardo,
a Carmelite ; of Andrea, a Neapolitan ; of Guiniforte Bazzisio, a
Bergamese ; of Fra. Paolo Albertino ; and of several writers whose
names are unknown, and whose toils, when Pelli wrote, were con-
cealed in the dust of private libraries.2 About the year 1350,
Giovanni Visconti, archbishop of Milan, selected six of the most
learned men in Italy, two divines, two philosophers, and two
Florentines ; and gave it them in charge to contribute their joint
endeavours towards the compilation of an ample comment, a copy of
which is preserved in the Laurentian library at Florence. Who
these were is no longer known ; but Jacopo della Lana,3 and
Petrarch, are conjectured to "have been among the number. At

1 Tiraboschi, Stor. della Foes. Ital. vol. ii. p. 39 ; and Pelli, p. 119.

2 The Lcttera di Eustazio Dicearcheo, etc., mentioned above, p. xxxv., con-
tains many extracts from an early MS. of the Divina Conwiedia, with marginal
notes in Latin, preserved in the monastery of Monte Casino. To these
extracts I shall have frequent occasion to refer.

3 Pelli, p. 119, informs us, that the writer, who is termed sometimes "the
good," sometimes the "old commentator," by those deputed to correct the
Decameron, in the preface to their explanatory notes, and who began his work
in 1334, is known to be Jacopo della Lana ; and that his commentary was trans-
lated into Latin by Alberigo da Rosada, Doctor of Laws at Bologna.

xxxviii LIFE OF DANTE.

Florence, a public lecture was founded for the purpose of explaining
a poem, that was at the same time the boast and the disgrace of the
city. The decree for this institution was passed in 1373 ; and in
that year Boccaccio, the first of their writers in prose, was appointed,
with an annual salary of a hundred florens, to deliver lectures in one
of the churches, on the first of their poets. On this occasion he
wrote his comment, which extends only to a part of the Inferno, and
has been printed. In 1375 Boccaccio died ; and among his successors
in this honourable employment we find the names of Antonio
Piovano in 1381, and of Filippo Villani in 1401.

The example of Florence was speedily followed by Bologna, by
Pisa, by Piacenza, and by Venice. Benvenuto da Imola, on whom
the office of lecturer devolved at Bologna, sustained it for the space
of ten years. From the comment, which he composed for the
purpose, and which he sent abroad in 1379, those passages, that tend
to illustrate the history of Italy, have been published by Muratori.1
At Pisa, the same charge was committed to Francesco da Buti about
1386.

On the invention of printing, in the succeeding century, Dante
was one of those writers who were first and most frequently given
to the press. But I do not mean to enter on an account of the
numerous editions of our author, which were then, or have since
been published ; but shall content myself with adding such remarks
as have occurred to me on reading the principal writers, by whose
notes those editions have been accompanied.

Of the four chief commentators on Dante, namely, Landino,
Vellutello, Venturi, and Lombardi, the first appears to enter most
thoroughly into the mind of tlie Poet. Within little more than a
century of the time in which Dante had lived ; himself a Florentine,
while Florence was still free, and still retained something of her
ancient simplicity ; the associate of those great men who adorned
the age of Lorenzo de' Medici ; Landino 2 was the most capable of
forming some estimate of the mighty stature of his compatriot, who
was indeed greater than them all. His taste for the classics, which
were then newly revived, and had become the principal objects of

public curiosity, as it impaired his relish for what has not inaptly

, — . t

1 Antiq. Ital. vol. i. The Italian comment published under the name of
Benvenuto da Imola, at Milan, in 1473, and at Venice in 1477, is altogether
different from that which Muratori has brought to light, and appears to be the
same as the Italian comment of Jacopo della Lana before mentioned. See
Tiraboschi.

2 Cristofforo Landino was born in 1424, and died in 1504 or 1508. See
Bandini, Specimen Litterat. Florent. edit. Florence, 1751.

LIFE OF DANTE. xxxix

been termed the romantic literature, did not, it is true, improve him
for a critic on the IHvina Commedia. The adventures of King
Arthur, by which 1 Dante had been delighted, appeared to Landino
no better than a fabulous and inelegant book.2 He is, besides, some-
times, unnecessarily prolix ; at others, silent, where a real difficulty
asks for solution ; and, now and then, a little visionary in his interpret-
ation. The commentary of his successor, Vellutello,3 is more evenly
diffused over the text ; and although without pretensions to the
higher qualities, by which Landino is distinguished, he is generally
under the influence of a sober good sense, which renders him a steady
and useful guide. Venturi,4 who followed after a long interval of
time, was too much swayed by his principles, or his prejudices, as a
Jesuit, to suffer him to judge fairly of a Ghibelline poet ; and either
this bias, or a real want of tact for the higher excellence of his
author, or, perhaps, both these imperfections together, betray him
into such impertinent and injudicious sallies, as dispose us to quarrel
with our companion, though, in the main, a very attentive one,
generally acute and lively, and at times even not devoid of a better
understanding for the merits of his master. To him, and in our own
times, has succeeded the Padre Lombardi.5 This good Franciscan,
no doubt, must have given himself much pains to pick out and
separate those ears of grain, which had escaped the flail of those who
had gone before him in that labour. But his zeal to do something
new often leads him to do something that is not over wise ; and if
on certain occasions we applaud his sagaciousness, on others we do
not less wonder that his ingenuity should have been so strangely
perverted. His manner of writing is awkward and tedious ; his
attention, more than is necessary, directed to grammatical niceties ;
and his attachment to one of the old editions, so excessive, as to
render him disingenuous or partial in his representation of the rest.
But to compensate this, he is a good Ghibelline ; and his opposition
to Venturi seldom fails to awaken him into a perception of those
beauties which had only exercised the spleen of the Jesuit.

He, who shall undertake another commentary on Dante 6 yet com-

1 See Note to Purgatory, xxvi. 132.

2 " II favoloso, e non molto elegante libro della Tavola Rotonda." Landino,
in the Notes to the Paradise, xvi.

3 Alessandro Vellutello was born in 1519.

4 Pompeo Venturi was born in 1693, and died in 1752.

5 Baldassare Lombardi died January 2, 1802. See Cancellieri, Osservazioni,
etc., Roma, 1814, p. 112.

6 Francesco Cionacci, a noble Florentine, projected an edition of the Divina
Commedia in one hundred volumes, each containing a single canto, followed by

xl LIFE OF DANTE.

pleter than any of those which have hitherto appeared, must make
use of these four, but depend on none. To them he must add several
others of minor note, whose diligence will nevertheless be found of
some advantage, and among whom I can particularly distinguish
Volpi. Besides this, many commentaries and marginal annotations,
that are yet inedited, remain to be examined ; many editions and
manuscripts l to be more carefully collated ; and many separate
dissertations and works of criticism to be considered. But this is
not all. That line of reading which the Poet himself appears to
have pursued (and there are many vestiges in his works by which
we shall be enabled to discover it) must be diligently tracked ; and
the search, I have little doubt, would lead to sources of information,
equally profitable and unexpected.

If there is any thing of novelty in the Notes which accompany the
following translation, it will be found to consist chiefly in a com-
parison of the Poet with himself, that is, of the Divina Commedia with
his other writings ; 2 a mode of illustration so obvious, that it is only to
be wondered how others should happen to have made so little use of
it. As to the imitations of my author by later poets, Italian and
English, which I have collected in addition to those few that had
been already remarked, they contribute little or nothing to the
purposes of illustration, but must be considered merely as matter of
curiosity, and as instances of the manner in which the great
practitioners in art do not scruple to profit by their predecessors.

all the commentaries, according to the order of time in which they were
written, and accompanied by a Latin translation for the use of foreigners.
Cancellieri, ibid. p. 64.

1 The Count Mortara has lately shown me many various readings he has
remarked on collating the numerous MSS. of Dante in the Canonici collection
at the Bodleian. It is to he hoped he will make them public [Janr>'. 1843.]

2 The edition which is referred to in the following notes, is that printed at
Venice in 2 vols. 8vo, 1793.

CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW

OF

THE AGE OF DANTE.

A.D.

1265 May.— DANTE, son of Alighieri degli Aligliieri and Bella, is

born at Florence. Of his own ancestry he speaks in the

Paradise, Canto xv. and xvi.
In the same year, Manfredi, king of Naples and Sicily, is

defeated and slain by Charles of Anjou. II. xxviii. 13, and

Purg. iii. 110.
Guido Novello of Polenta obtains the sovereignty of Ravenna.

H. xxvii. 38.
Battle of Evesham. Simon de Montfort, leader of the barons,

defeated and slain.

1266 Two of the Frati Godenti chosen arbitrators of the differences

of Florence. H. xxiii. 104.
Gianni de' Soldanieri heads the populace in that city.

H. xxxii. 118.
Roger Bacon sends a copy of his Opus Majus to Pope Clement

IV.
1268 Charles of Anjou puts Conradine to death, and becomes king

of Naples. H. xxviii. 16, and Purg. xx. 66.
1270 Louis IX. of France dies before Tunis. His widow, Beatrice,

daughter of Raymond Berenger, lived till 1295. Purg. vii.

126 ; Par. vi. 135.

xll

xlii CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW

A.D.

1272 Henry III. of England is succeeded by Edward I. Purg. vii.

129.
Guy de Montfort murders Prince Henry, son of Ricnard,

king of the Romans, and nephew of Henry III. of England,

at Viterbo. H. xii. 119. Richard dies, as is supposed, of

grief for this event.
Abulfeda, the Arabic writer, is born.

1274 Our Poet first sees Beatrice, daughter of Folco Portinari.
Rodolph acknowledged emperor.

Philip III. of France marries Mary of Brabant, who lived till

1321. Purg. vi. 24.
Thomas Aquinas dies. Purg. xx. 67, and Par. x. 96.
Buonaventura dies. Par. xii. 25.

1275 Pierre de la Brosse, secretary to Philip III. of France, executed.

Purg. vi. 23.

1276 Giotto, the painter, is born. Purg. xi. 95.
Pope Adrian V. dies. Purg. xix. 97.

Guido Guinicelli, the poet, dies. Purg. xi. 96, and xxvi. 83.

1277 Pope John XXI. dies. Par. xii. 126.

1278 Ottocar, king of Bohemia, dies. Purg. vii. 97. Robert of

Gloucester is living at this time.

1279 Dionysius succeeds to the throne of Portugal. Par. xix. 135.

1280 Albertus Magnus dies. Par. x. 95.

Our Poet's friend, Busone da Gubbio, is born about this time.

See the Life of Dante prefixed.
William of Ockham is born about this time.

1281 Pope Nicholas III. dies. H. xix. 71.

Dante studies at the universities of Bologna and Padua.
About this time Ricordano Malaspina, the Florentine annalist,
dies.

1282 The Sicilian vespers. Par. viii. 80.

The French defeated by the people of Forli. H. xxvii. 41.
Tribaldello de' Manfredi betrays the city of Faenza. H. xxxii.
119.

OF THE AGE OF DANTE. xliii

A.D.

1284 Prince Charles of Anjou is defeated and made prisoner by

Rugier de Lauria, admiral to Peter III. of Arragon. Purg.

xx. 78.
Charles I. king of Naples, dies. Purg. vii. 111.
Alonzo X. of Castile, dies. He caused the Bible to be translated

into Castilian, and all legal instruments to be diawn up in

that language. Sancho IV. succeeds him.
Philip (next year IV. of France) marries Jane, daughter of

Henry of Navarre. Purg. vii. 102.

1285 Pope Martin IV. dies. Purg. xxiv. 23.

Philip III. of France and Peter III. of Arragon die. Purg.

vii. 101 and 110.
Henry II. king of Cyprus, comes to the throne. Par. xix.

144.
Simon Memmi, the painter, celebrated by Petrarch, is born.

1287 Guido- dalle Colonne (mentioned by Dante in his De Vulgari

Eloquio) writes " The War of Troy."
Pope Honorius IV. dies.

1288 Haquin, king of Norway, makes war on Denmark. Par. xix.

135.
Count Ugolino de' Gherardeschi dies of famine. H. xxxiii. 14.
The Scottish poet, Thomas Learmouth, commonly called

Thomas the Rhymer, is living at this time.

1289 Dante is in the battle of Campaldino, where the Florentines

defeat the people of Arezzo, June 11. Purg. v. 90.

1290 Beatrice dies. Purg. xxxii. 2.

He serves in the war waged by the Florentines upon the Pisans,

and is present at the surrender of Caprona in the autumn.

H. xxi. 92.
Guido dalle Colonne dies.
William, marquis of Montferrat, is made prisoner by his

traitorous subjects, at Alessandria in Lombardy. Purg. vii.

133.
Michael Scot dies. II. xx. 115.

xliv CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW

A.D.

1291 Dante marries Gemma de' Donati, with whom he lives un-

happily. By this marriage he had five sons and a daughter.
Can Grande della Scala is born, March 9. H. i. 98 ; Parg. xx.

16 ; Par xvii. 75, and xxvii. 135.
The renegade Christians assist the Saracens to recover St. John

D'Acre. H. xxvii. 84.
The Emperor Rodolph dies. Purg. vi. 104, and vii. 91.
Alonzo III. of Arragon dies, and is succeeded by James II.

Purg. vii. 113, and Par. xix. 133.
Eleanor, widow of Henry III., dies. Par. vi. 135.

1292 Pope Nicholas IV. dies.
Roger Bacon dies.

John Baliol, king of Scotland, crowned.

1294 Clement V. abdicates the papal chair. H. iii. 56.
Dante writes his Vita Nuova.

Fra Guittone d'Arezzo, the poet, dies. Purg. xxiv. 56.
Andrea Taffi, of Florence, the worker in Mosaic, dies.

1295 Dante's preceptor, Brunetto Latini, dies. H. xv. 28.
Charles Martel, king of Hungary, visits Florence, Par. viii.

57, and dies in the same year.
Frederick, son of Peter III. of Arragon, becomes king of Sicily.

Purg. vii. 117, and Par. xix. 127.
Taddeo, the physician of Florence, called the Hippocratean,

dies. Par. xii. 77.
Marco Polo, the traveller, returns from the East to Venice.
Ferdinand IV. of Castile comes to the throne. Par. xix. 122.

1296 Forese, the companion of Dante, dies. Purg. xxxiii. 44.
Sadi, the most celebrated of the Persian writers, dies.

War between England and Scotland, which terminates in the
submission of the Scots to Edward I. ; but in the following
year, Sir William Wallace attempts the deliverance of
Scotland. Par. xix. 121.

1298 The Emperor Adolphus falls in a battle with his rival,
Albert I , who succeeds him in the Empire. Purg. vi. 98.

OF THE AGE OF DANTE. xlv

A.D.

1298 Jacopo da Varagine, archbishop of Genoa, author 'of the
Legenda Aurea, dies.

1300 The Bianca and Nera parties take their rise in Pistoia. II.

xxxii. 60.
This is the year in which he supposes himself to see his Vision.

II. i. 1, and xxi. 109.
He is chosen chief magistrate, or first of the Priors of Florence :

and continues in office from June 15, to August 15.
Cimabue, the painter, dies. Purg. xi. 93.
Guido Cavalcanti, the most beloved of our Poet's friends, dies.

H. x. 59, and Purg. xi. 96.

1301 The Bianca party expels the Nera from Pistoia. H. xxiv. 142.

1302 January 27. During his absence at Rome, Dante is mulcted

by his fellow-citizens in the sum of 8000 lire, and con-
demned to two years' banishment.

1302 March 10. He is sentenced, if taken, to be burned.
Fulcieri de' Calboli commits great atrocities on certain of the

Ghibelline party. Purg. xiv. 61.
Carlino de' Pazzi betrays the castle di Piano Travigne, in

Valdarno, to the Florentines. H. xxxii. 67.
The French vanquished in the battle of Courtrai. Purg. xx. 47.
James, king of Majorca and Minorca, dies. Par. xix. 133.

1303 Pope Boniface VIII. dies. H. xix. 55 ; Purg. xx. 86, xxxii.

146 ; and Par. xxvii. 20.
The other exiles appoint Dante one of a council of twelve,

under Alessandro da Romena. He appears to have been

much dissatisfied with his colleagues. Par. xvii. 61.
Robert of Brunne translates into English verse the Manuel

de Peche's, a treatise written in French by Robert Grosseteste,

bishop of Lincoln.

1304 Dante joins with the exiles in an unsuccessful attack on the

city of Florence.
May. The bridge over the Arno breaks down during a
representation of the infernal torments exhibited on that
river. H. xxvi. 9.

xlvi CHRONOLOGICAL VIEW

A.D.

1304 July 20. Petrarch, whose father had been banished two years

before from Florence, is born at Arezzo.

1305 Winceslaus II., king of Bohemia, dies. Purg. vii. 99, and Par.

xix. 123.
A conflagration happens at Florence. H. xxvi. 9.
Sir William Wallace is executed at London.
1308 Dante visits Padua.

1307 He is in Lunigiana with the Marchese Marcello Malaspina.

Purg. viii. 133, xix. 140.
Dolcino, the fanatic, is burned. H. xxviii. 53.
Edward II. of England conies to the throne.

1308 The Emperor Albert I. murdered. Purg. vi. 98, and Par. xix.

114.
Corso Donati, Dante's political enemy, slain. Purg. xxiv. 81.
He seeks an asylum at Verona, under the roof of the Signori

della Scala. Par. xvii. G9.
He wanders, about this time, over various parts of Italy. See

his Convito. He is at Paris a second time ; and, according

to one of the early commentators, visits Oxford.
Robert, the patron of Petrarch, is crowned king of Sicily.

Par. ix. 2.
Duns Scotus dies. He was born about the same time as

Dante.

1309 Charles II., king of Naples, dies. Par. xix. 125.

1310 The Order of the Templars abolished. Purg. xx. 94.

Jean de Meun, the continuer of the Roman de la Rose, dies

about this time.
Pier Crescenzi of Bologna writes his book on agriculture, in

Latin.

1311 Fra Giordano da Rivalta, of Pisa, a Dominican, the author of

sermons esteemed for the purity of the Tuscan language,
dies.

1312 Robert, king of Sicily, opposes the coronation of the Emperor

Henry VII. Par. viii. 59.

OF THE AGE OF DANTE. xlvii

A.D.

1312 Ferdinand IV. of Castile dies, and is succeeded by Alonzo XI.
Dino Compagni, a distinguished Florentine, concludes his

history of his own time, written in elegant Italian.
Gaddo Gaddi, the Florentine artist, dies.

1313 The Emperor Henry of Luxemburgh, by whom he had hoped

to be restored to Florence, dies. Par. xvii. 80, and xxx.

135. Henry is succeeded by Lewis of Bavaria.
Dante takes refuge at Eavenna, with Guido Novello da

Polenta.
Giovanni Boccaccio is born.
Pope Clement V. dies. H. xix. 86, and Par. xxvii. 53, and

xxx. 141.

1314 Philip IV. of France dies. Purg. vii. 108, and Par. xix. 117.
Louis X. succeeds.

Ferdinand IV. of Spain dies. Par. xix. 122.
Giacopo da Carrara defeated by Can Grande, who makes
himself master of Vicenza. Par. ix. 45.

1315 Louis X. of France marries Clemenza, sister to our Poet's

friend, Charles Martel, king of Hungary. Par. ix. 2.

1316 Louis X. of France dies, and is succeeded by Philip V.
John XXII. elected Pope. Par. xxvii. 53.
Joinville, the French historian, dies about this time.

1320 About this time John Gower is born, eight years before his

friend Chaucer.

1321 July. Dante dies at Eavenna, of a complaint brought on by

disappointment at his failure in a negotiation which he had
been conducting with the Venetians, for his patron Guido
Novello da Polenta.
His obsequies are sumptuously performed at Eavenna by
Guido, who himself died in the ensuing year.

THE VISION OF DANTE.
SelL

THE VISION OF DANTE.

CANTO I.

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 pro-
mises to show him the punishments of Hell, and afterwards of Purgatory ;
and that he shall then be conducted by Beatrice into Paradise. He follows
the Roman poet.

In the midway 1 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 2 only, my dismay
Renews, in bitterness not far from death.
Yet, to discourse of what there good befel,
All else will I relate disco ver'd there.

How first I enter'd it I scarce can say,
Such sleepy dulness in thaf instant weigh'd
My senses down, when the true path I left ;
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

1 In the midway.'] That the sera of the Poem is intended by these words
to be fixed to the thirty-fifth year of the poet's age, A.D. 1300, will appear
more plainly in Canto xxi., where that date is explicitly marked. In his
Convito, human life is compared to an arch or bow, the highest point of which
is, in those well framed by nature, at their thirty-fifth year. Opere di Dante,
ediz. Ven. 8vo, 1793, t. 1. p. 195.

2 IVhich to remember.] "Even when I remember I am afraid, and trembling
taketh hold on my flesh." Job xxi. 6.

3

4 THE VISION. 16—39.

Already vested with that planet's beam,1

Who leads all wanderers safe through every way.

Then was a little respite to the fear,
That in my heart's recesses 2 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 3 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 past and lived. My weary frame
After short pause recomforted, again
I journey'd on over that lonely steep,
The hinder foot still firmer.4 Scarce the ascent
Began, when, lo ! a panther,5 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,6
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 7

1 That planet's beam.] The sun.

2 My heart's recesses.] Nel lago del cuor. Lombardi cites an imitation of
this by Redi in his Ditirambo :

I buon viui son quegli, che acquetano
Le procelle si fosche e rubelle,
Che nel lago del cuor l'anime inquietano.

3 Turns.] So in our Poet's second psalm :

Come colui, che andando per lo bosco,

Da spino punto, a quel si volge e guarda.
Even as one, in passing through a wood,
Pierced by a thorn, at which he turns and looks.

4 Tlie hinder foot.] It is to be remembered, that in ascending a hill the
weight of the body rests on the hinder foot.

5 A panther.] Pleasure or luxury.

6 With those stars.] The sun was in Aries, in which sign he supposes it to
have begun its course at the creation.

7 The gay skin.] A late editor of the Divina Commedia, Signor Zotti, has
spoken of the present translation as the only one that has rendered this passage
rightly : but Mr. Hayley had shown me the way, in his very skilful version of
the first three Cantos of the Inferno, inserted in the notes to his Essay on Epic
Poetry :

I now was raised to hope sublime
By these bright omens of my fate benign,
The beauteous beast and the sweet hour of prim

All the commentators, whom I have seen, understand our Poet to say that the
season of the year and the hour of the day induced him to hope for the gay

40—60. HELL, Canto I. 5

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 head held aloft and hunger-mad,
That e'en the air was fear-struck. A she- wolf 2
Was at his heels, who in her leanness seem'd
Full 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 unwares is gone, he inwardly
Mourns with heart-griping anguish ; such was I,
Haunted by that fell beast, never at peace,
Who coining o'er against me, by degrees
Impell'd me where the sun in silence rests.3

While to the lower space witli backward step
I fell, my ken discern'd the form of one
Whose voice seem'd faint through long disuse of speech.
When him in that great desert I espied,

skin of the panther ; and there is something in the sixteenth Canto, verse 107,
which countenances their interpretation, although that which I have followed
still appears to me the more probable.

1 A Hon.] Pride or ambition.

2 A she<oolf.~\ Avarice. It cannot be doubted that the image of these three
beasts coming against him is taken by our author from the prophet Jeremiah,
v. 6: "Wherefore a lion out of the forest shall slay them, and a wolf of the
evenings shall spoil them, a leopard shall watch over their cities." Kossetti,
following Dionisi and other later commentators, interprets Dante's leopard to
denote Florence, his lion the king of France, and his wolf the Court of Rome.
It is far from improbable that our author might have had a second allegory of
this sort in his view ; even as Spenser, in the introductory letter to his poem,
tells us that "in the Faery Queen he meant Glory in his general intention,
but in his particular he conceived the most excellent and glorious person of his
sovereign the Queen." "And yet," he adds, "in some places else I do other-
wise shadow her." Such involution of allegorical meanings may well be
supposed to have been frequently present to the mind of Dante throughout the
composition of this poem. Whether his acute and eloquent interpreter,
Rossetti, may not have been carried much too far in the pursuit of a favourite
hypothesis, is another question ; and I must avow my disbelief of the secret
jargon imputed to our poet and the other writers of that time in the Comment
on the Divina Commedia and in the Spirito Antipapale, the latter of which
works is familiarized to the English reader in Miss Ward's faithful translation.

3 Where the sun in silence rests.]

The sun to me is dark, When she deserts the night,

And silent as the moon, Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.

Milton, Sam. Agon.
The same metaphor will recur, Canto v. verse 29.

Into a place I came
Where light was silent all.

6 THE VISION. 61—94.

" Have mercy on me," cried I out aloud,
" Spirit ! or living man ! whate'er thou be."

He answer'd : " Now not man, man once I was,
And born of Lombard parents, Mantuans both
By country, when the power of Julius 1 yet
Was scarcely firm. At Eome 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.2
But thou, say wherefore to such perils past
Eeturn'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 witli front abash'd replied.
"Glory and light of all the tuneful train !
May it avail rne, that I long with zeal
Have sought thy volume, and with love immense
Have conn'd it o'er. My master thou, and guide ! 3
Thou he from whom alone I have derived
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 hindrance makes than death :
So bad and so accursed in her kind,
That never sated is her ravenous will,

1 When the power of Julius.]

Nacqui sub Julio, ancorche fosse tardi.

This is explained by the commentators : "Although it were rather late with
respect to my birth, before Julius Caesar assumed the supreme authority, and
made himself perpetual dictator." Virgil indeed was born twenty-five years
before that event.

2 Ilium's haughty totvers.]

Ceciditque superbum
Ilium. Virgil, JEn. iii. 3.

3 My Piaster thou, and guide.]

Tu se' lo mio maestro, e' 1 mio autore,
Tu se' solo colui.

Thou art my father, thou my author, thou.

Milton, P. L. ii. 864.

95—113. HELL, Canto I. 7

Still after food l more craving than before.

To many an animal in wedlock vile

She fastens, and shall yet to many more,

Until that greyhound 2 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.3 In his might

Shall safety to Italia's plains 4 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

1 Still after food.] So Frezzi :

La voglia sempre ha fame, e mai non s'empie,
Ed al piu pasto piu riman digiuna.

II Quadriregio, lib. 2. cap. xi.

Veuturi observes that the verse in the original is borrowed by Berni.

2 That greyhound.'] This passage has been commonly understood as an
eulogium on the liberal spirit of his Veronese patron, Can Grande della Scala.

3 'Twixt either Feltro.] Verona, the country of Can della Scala, is situated
between Feltro, a city in the Marca Trivigiana, and Monte Feltro, a city in the
territory of Urbino. But Dante perhaps does not merely point out the place
of Can Grande's nativity, for he may allude further to a prophecy, ascribed to
Michael Scot, which imported that the " Dog of Verona would be lord of Padua
and of all the Marca Trivigiana." It was fulfilled in the year 1329, a little
before Can Grande's death. See G. Villani, Hist. lib. 10. cap. cv. and cxli. and
some lively criticism by Gasparo Gozzi, entitled Giudizio degli Antichi Poeti,
etc., printed at the end of the Zatta edition of Dante, t. 4. part ii. p. 15. The
prophecy, it is likely, was a forgery ; for Michael died before 1300, when Can
Grande was only nine years old. See Hell, xx. 115, and Par. xvii. 75. Troya
has given a new interpretation to Dante's prediction, which he applies to
Uguccione della Faggiola, whose country also was situated between two Feltros.
See the Veltro Allegorico di Dante, p. 110. But after all the pains he has
taken, this very able writer fails to make it clear that Uguccione, though
he acted a prominent part as a Ghibelline leader, is intended here or in
Purgatory, c. xxxni. 38. The main proofs rest on an ambiguous report
mentioned by Boccaccio of the Inferno being dedicated to him, and on a
suspicious letter attributed to a certain friar Ilario, in which the friar describes
Dante addressing him as a stranger, and desiring him to convey that portion
of the poem to Uguccione. There is no direct allusion to him throughout the
Divina Commedia, as there is to the other chief public protectors of our poet
during his exile.

4 Italia's plains.] " Umile Italia," from Virgil, ^En. lib. 3. 522.

Humilemque videmus
Italiam.

THE VISION. 114—132.

A second death ; 1 and those next view, who dwell
Content in fire,2 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 3 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. O happy those,
Whom there he chuses! " I to him in few :
" Bard ! by that God, whom thou didst not adore,
I do beseech thee (that this ill and worse
I may escape) to lead me where thou said'st,
That I Saint Peter's gate 4 may view, and those
Who, as thou tell'st, are in such dismal plight."
Onward he moved, I close his steps pursued.

CANTO II.

^Ujjttnunt.

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 him as his guide and master.

Now was the day departing,5 and the air,
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.

1 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." Rev. ix. 6.

2 Content in fire.] The spirits in Purgatory.

* A spirit xoorthier.] Beatrice, who conducts the Poet through Paradise.

4 Saint Peter's gate.] The gate of Purgatory, which the Poet feigns to be
guarded by an angel placed on that station by St. Peter.

5 Now was the day.] A compendium of Virgil's description, jEn. lib. 4.
522. Compare Apollonius Rhodius, lib. 3. 744, and lib. 4. 1058.

The day gan failin ; and the darke night,

That revith bestis from their businesse,

Berafte me my booke, etc. Chaucer, The Assemble of Foules.

7-45. HELL, Canto II. 9

0 Muses ! 0 high genius ! now vouchsafe
Your aid. 0 mind ! « that all I saw hast kept
Safe in a written record, here thy worth

And eminent endowments come to proof.

1 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,2

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 favour 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

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 3 also travel'd there,4

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 ^Eneas 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,

1 0 mind."]

0 thought ! that write all that I met, Of my braine, now shall men see
And in the tresorie it set If any virtue in thee be.

Chaucer, Temple of Fame, b. 2. v. 18.

2 Silvius' sire."] tineas.

3 The chosen vessel.] St. Paul. Acts ix. 15. "But the Lord said unto him.
Go thy way ; for he is a chosen vessel unto me."

4 There.] This refers to "the immortal tribes," v. 15, St. Paul having
been caught up to heaven. 2 Cor. xii. 2.

10 THE VISION. 46-76.

" Thy soul is by vile fear assail'd,1 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,2 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 :
' 0 courteous shade of Mantua ! thou whose fame
' Yet lives, and shall live long as nature lasts ! 3
'A friend, not of my fortune but myself,4
' On the wide desert in his road has met
* Hindrance so great, 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 ; 5 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 :
' 0 Lady ! by whose influence alone

1 Thy soul is by vile fear assail'd.}

L'anima tua e da viltate offesa.

So in Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 3. c. i. st. 53. Se l'alma avete offesa da viltate.

2 Who rest suspended.] The spirits in Limbo, neither admitted to a state of
glory nor doomed to punishment.

3 As nature lasts.] Quanto '1 moto lontana. "Mondo," instead of
" moto," which Lombardi claims as a reading peculiar to the Nidobeatina
edition and some MSS., is also in Landino's edition of 1484. Of this Monti
was not aware. See his Proposta, under the word " Lontanare."

4 A friend, not of my fortune but myself.] Se non fortunae sed hominibus
solere esse amicum. Cornelii Nepotis Attici Vitos, cap. ix.

Caetera fortunae, non mea turba, fuit. Ovid, Trist. lib. 1. el. v. 34.

My Fortune and my seeming destiny

He made the bond, and broke it not with me.

Coleridge's Death of Wallenstein, act i. sc. 7.

5 Beatrice.] The daughter of Folco Portinari, who is here invested with
the character of celestial wisdom or theology. See the Life of Dante pre-
fixed.

77—116. HELL, Canto II. 11

1 Mankind excels whatever is contain'd l

4 Within that heaven which hath the smallest orb,

1 So thy command delights me, that to obey,

1 If it were done already, would seem late.

1 No need hast thou farther 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
1 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 dame2
' Resides, who mourns with such effectual grief
' That hindrance, which I send thee to remove,

' That God's stern judgment to her will inclines.

* To Lucia 3 calling, her she thus bespake :

" Now doth thy faithful servant need thy aid,
" And I commend him to thee." At her word
1 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 succour lent

u 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,

" Swoln mightier than a sea, him struggling holds ? "

* Ne'er among men did any with such speed
1 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 honour brings.'
"When she had ended, her bright beaming eyes

1 Whatever is contain'd.] Every other thing comprised within the lunar
heaven, which, being the lowest of all, has the smallest circle.

2 A blessed dame.] The Divine Mercy.

3 Lucia.] The enlightening Grace of Heaven ; as it is commonly explained.
But Lombardi has well observed, that as our Poet places her in the Paradise,
c. xxxii., amongst the souls of the blessed, so it is probable that she, like
Beatrice, had a real existence ; and he accordingly supposes her to have been
Saint Lucia the martyr, although she is here representative of an abstract
idea.

12 THE VISION". 117—141.

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
Harbour vile fear ? why hast not courage there,
And noble daring ; since three maids,1 so blest,
Thy safety plan, e'en in the court of heaven ;
And so much certain good my words forebode ?"

As florets,2 by the frosty air of night
Bent down and closed, when day has blancli'd their leaves,
Rise all unfolded on their spiry stems ;
So was my fainting vigour new restored,
And to my heart such kindly courage ran,
That I as one undaunted soon replied :
" 0 full of pity she, who undertook
My succour! 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.
Lead on : one only will is in us both.
Thou art my guide, my master thou, and lord."

So spake I ; and when he had onward moved,
I enter'd on the deep and woody way.

1 Three maids.] The Divine Mercy, Lucia, and Beatrice.

2 As florets.] Come fioretto dal notturno gelo

Chinato e chiuso, poi che il sol l'imbianca,
S'apre e si leva dritto sopra il stelo.

Boccaccio, II Filostrato, part iii. st. 13.

But right as fioures through the cold of night
Iclosed, stoupen in her stalkes lowe,
Redressen hem agen the sunne bright,
And spreden in her kinde course by rowe, etc.

Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, b. 2.

It is from Boccaccio rather than Dante that Chaucer has taken this simile,
which he applies to Troilus on the same occasion as Boccaccio lias done. He
appears indeed to have imitated or rather paraphrased the Filostrato in Lis
Troilus and Creseide ; for it is not yet known who that Lollius is, from whom
lie professes to take the poem, and* who is again mentioned in tLe House of
Fame, b. 3. TLe simile in tLe text Las been imitated by many others ;
among whom see Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 1. c. xii. st. 86 ; Marino, Adone, c.
xvii. st. 63, and Son. "Donna vestita di nero ;" and Spenser's Faery Queen,
b. 4. c. xii. st. 34, and b. 6. c. ii. st. 35 ; and Boccaccio again in the Teseide,
lib. 9. st. 23.

1—21. HELL, Canto III. 13

CANTO IIL

Argument.

Dante, following Virgil, comes 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 punished who had passt 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 takes the spirits
over to the opposite shore ; which as soon as Dante reaches, he is seized
with terror, and falls into a trance.

" Through 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.1
Before me things create were none, save things
Eternal, and eternal I endure.
All hope abandon,2 ye who enter here."

Such characters, in colour 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 extinguished. We are come
Where I have told thee we shall see the souls
To misery doom'd, who intellectual good
Have lost." And when his hand 3 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,4 with lamentations and loud moans,

•Power divine,

Supremest wisdom, and primeval love.]
The three Persons of the Blessed Trinity.

2 All hope abandon.'] Lasciate ogni speranza voi ch' entrate.

So Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 1. c. viii. st. 53. Lascia pur della vita ogni speranza.

3 And when his hand.]

With that my hand in his he caught anone ;
On which I comfort caught, and went in fast.

Chaucer, The Assemble of Foules.

4 Here sighs.] "Post hoec omnia ad loca tartarea, et ad os infernalis
baratri deductus sum, qui simile videbatur puteo, loca vero eadem horridis
tenebris, foetoribus exhalantibus, stridorib'us quoque et nimiis plena erant
ejulatibus, juxta quem infernum vermis erat infinite magnitudinis, ligatus
maxima catena." Alberici Visio, sec. 9.

14 THE VISION. 22—50.

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 for ever whirls

Round through that air with solid darkness stain'd,

Like to the sand x that in the whirlwind flies.

I then, with error 2 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 3
Should glory thence with exultation vain."

I then : "Master ! what doth aggrieve them thus,
That thev lament so loud ? " He straight replied :
" That will I tell thee briefly. These of death
No hope may entertain : and their blind life
So meanly passes, that all other lots
They envy. Fame 4 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,5

1 Like to the sand.] Unnumber'd as the sands

Of Barca or Cyrene's torrid soil,

Levied to side with warring winds, and poise

Their lighter wings. Milton, P. L. b. 2. 903.

2 With error.] Instead of " error," Vellntello's edition of 1544 has " orror,"
a reading remarked also by Landino, in his notes. So much mistaken is the
collater of the Monte Casino MS. in calling it "lezione da niuno notata ;" "a
reading which no one has observed."

3 Lest the accursed tribe.] Lest the rebellious angels should exult at seeing
those who were neutral, and therefore less guilty, condemned to the same
punishment with themselves. Kossetti, in a long note on this passage,
has ably exposed the plausible interpretation of Monti, who would have
" alcuna gloria" mean "no glory," and thus make Virgil say "that the
evil ones would derive no honour from the society of the neutral." A
similar mistake in the same word is made elsewhere by Lombardi. See my
note on c. xii. v. 9.

4 Fame.] Cancel'd from heaven and sacred memory,

Nameless in dark oblivion let them dwell.

Milton, P. L. b. 6. 380.
Therefore eternal silence be their doom. Ibid. 385.

5 A flag.] All the grisly legions that troop

Under the sooty flag of Acheron. Milton, Comus.

51—79. HELL, Canto III. 15

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 recognised, I saw
And knew the shade of him, who to base fear x
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 onwards, I beheld
A throng upon the shore of a great stream :
Whereat I 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 1 " 2 He thus to me in few :
" This shalt thou know, soon as our steps arrive
Beside the woeful tide of Acheron."

Then with eyes downward cast, and fill'd with shame,
Fearing my words offensive to his ear,
Till we had reach'd the river, I from speech.
Abstain'd. And lo ! toward us in a bark
Comes on an old man,3 hoary white with eld,
Crying, " Woe to you, wicked spirits ! hope not
Ever to see the sky again. I come

Who to base fear

Yielding, abjured his high estate. ]

This is commonly understood of Celestine the Fifth, who abdicated the papal
power in 1294. Venturi mentions a work written by Innocenzio Barcellini, of
the Celestine order, and printed at Milan in 1701, in which an attempt is made
to put a different interpretation on this passage. Lombardi would apply it to
some one of Dante's fellow-citizens, who, refusing, through avarice or want of
spirit, to support the party of the Bianchi at Florence, had been the main
occasion of the miseries that befel them. But the testimony of Fazio degli
Uberti, who lived so near the time of our author, seems almost decisive on
this point. He expressly speaks of the Pope Celestine as being in hell. See
the Dittamondo, lib. 4. cap. xxi. The usual interpretation is further con-
firmed in a passage in Canto xxvii. v. 101. Petrarch, while he passes a high
encomium on Celestine for his abdication of the papal power, gives us to
understand that there were others who thought it a disgraceful act. See
the Be Vita Solit. b. 2. sec. iii. c. 18.

2 Through the blear light.'] Lo fioco lume. So Filicaja, canz. vi. st. 12:
Qual fioco lume.

* An old man.] Portitor has horrendus aquas et flumina servat
Terribili squalore Charon, cui plurima mento
Canities inculta jacet ; stant lumina flamma.

Virg. JEn. lib. 6. 298.

16 THE VISION. 80—104.

To take you to the other shore across,

Into eternal darkness, there to dwell

In fierce heat and in ice.1 And thou, who there

Standest, live spirit ! 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 2

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,3
Around whose eyes glared wheeling flames. Meanwhile
Those spirits, faint and naked, colour changed,
And gnash'd their teeth, soon as the cruel words
They heard. God and their parents they blasphemed,
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 pass
Who fears not God. Charon, demoniac form,
With eyes of burning coal,4 collects them all,
Beckoning, and each, that lingers, with his oar
Strikes. As fall off the light autumnal leaves,5

1 In fierce heat and in ice.] The bitter change

Of fierce extremes, extremes by change more fierce,

From beds of raging fire to starve in ice

Their soft ethereal warmth. Milton, P. L. b. 2. 601.

The delighted spirit

To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice.
Shakspeare, Measure for Measure, act iii. sc. 1. See note to c. xxxii. 23.

2 A nimbler boat.] He perhaps alludes to the bark "swift and light," in
which the angel conducts the spirits to Purgatory. See Purg. c. ii. 40.

3 The livid lake.] Vada livida. Virg. JEn. lib. 6. 320.

Totius ut lacfis putidaeque paludis

Lividissima, maximeque est profunda vorago. Catullus, xviii. 10.

4 With eyes of burning coal.]

His looks were dreadful, and his fiery eyes,
Like two great beacons, glared bright and wide.

Spenser, F. Q. b. 6. c. vii. st. 42.

5 As/all off the light autumnal leaves.]

Quam multa in silvis autumni frigore primo

Labsa cadunt folia. Virg. JEn. lib. 6. 309.

Thick as autumnal leaves, that strew the brooks

In Vallombrosa, where th' Etrurian shades

High over-arch'd imbower. Milton, P. L. b. 1. 304.

Compare Apoll. Rhod. lib. 4. p. 214.

105—126. HELL, Canto IV. 17

One still another following, till the bough
Strews all its honours 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.1

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
Down dropp'd, as one with sudden slumber seized.

CANTO IV.

Jtnjttnuttt.

The Poet, being roused by a clap of thunder, and following his guide onwards
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 lack of baptism, merit not the
bliss of Paradise. Hence he is led on by Virgil to descend into the second
circle.

Broke the deep slumber in my brain a crash
Of heavy thunder, that I shook myself,
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,

1 As falcon at his call.'] This is Vellutello's explanation, and seems prefer-
able to that commonly given : "as a bird that is enticed to the cage by the
call of another."

B

18 THE VISION. 8—47.

The dread abyss, that joins a thundrous sound x
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.

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,
It profits not, since baptism was not theirs,
The portal 2 to 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." 3 Sore grief assail'd
My heart at hearing this, for well I knew
Suspended in that Limbo many a soul
Of mighty worth. " 0 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 ? "

1 A thundrous sound.} Imitated, as Mr. Thyer has remarked, by Milton,
P. L. b. 8. 242 :

But long, ere our approaching, heard

Noise, other than the sound of dance or song,
Torment, and loud lament, and furious rage.

2 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 MSS. The other reading is " parte della fede ; " " part of the faith."

3 Desiring without hope.]

And with desire to languish without hope. Milton, P. L. b. 10. 995.

48—76. HELL, Canto IV. 19

Piercing the secret purport l of my speech,
He answer'd : " I was new to that estate,
When I beheld a puissant one 2 arrive
Amongst us, with victorious trophy crownd.
He forth 3 the shade of our first parent drew,
Abel his child, and Noah righteous man,
Of Moses lawgiver for faith approved,
Of patriarch Abraham, and David ting,
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
Discover'd that a tribe in honour high
That place possess'd. " 0 thou, who every art
And science valuest ! who are these, that boast
Such honour, separate from all the rest 1 "

He answer'd : " The renown of their great names,
That echoes through your world above, acquires
Favour in heaven, which holds them thus advanced."
Meantime a voice I heard : " Honour the bard
Sublime ! 4 his shade returns, that left us late ! "

1 Secret purport.'] Lombarcli 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
throughout the whole of this first part of the poem.

- A puissant one.] Our Saviour.

3 He forth.] The author of the Quadriregio has introduced a sublime
description into his imitation of this passage : —

Pose le reni la dove si serra ;

Ma Cristo lui e '1 catarcion d' acciajo
E queste porte allora getto a terra.
Quando in la grotta entro '1 lucido rajo,
Adamo disse : questo e lo splendore
Che mi spiro in faccia da primajo.
Venuto se' aspettato Signore. Lib. 2. cap. iii.

Satan hung writhing round the bolt ; but him,
The huge portcullis, and those gates of brass,
Christ threw to earth. As down the cavern stream'd
The radiance: " Light," said Adam, "this, that breathed
First on me. Thou art come, expected Lord ! "

Much that follows is closely copied by Frezzi from our Poet.

4 Honour the bard — Sublime.] Onorate V altissimo poeta. So Chiabrera,
Canz. Erioche. 32. Onorando 1' altissimo poeta.

20 THE VISION. 77—102

No sooner ceased the sound, than I beheld
Four mighty spirits toward us bend their steps,
Of semblance neither sorrowful nor glad.1

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 vein excelling ;
The third is Naso ; Lucan is the last.
Because they all that appellation own,
With which the voice singly accosted me,
Honouring they greet me thus, and well they judge."

So I beheld united the bright school
Of him the monarch of sublimest song,2
That o'er the others like a 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 honour 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.3 At foot
Of a magnificent castle we arrived,
Seven times with lofty walls begirt, and round

1 Of semblance neither sorrowful nor glad.]

She nas to sober ne to glad. Chaucer's Dream.

2 The monarch of sublimest song."] Homer. It appears from a passage in the
Convito, that there was no Latin translation of Homer in Dante's time.
"Sappia ciascuno," etc. p. 20. "Every one should know, that nothing,
harmonized by musical enchainment, can be transmuted from one tongue
into another without breaking all its sweetness and harmony. And this is
the reason why Homer has never been turned from Greek into Latin, as the
other writers we have of theirs." This sentence, I fear, may well be regarded
as conclusive against the present undertaking. Yet would I willingly bespeak
for it at least so much indulgence as Politian claimed for himself, when in the
Latin translation, which he afterwards made of Homer, but which has since
unfortunately perished, he ventured on certain liberties both of phraseology
and metre, for which the nicer critics of his time thought fit to call him to an
account: "Ego vero tametsi rudis in primis non adeo tamen obtusi sum
pectoris in versibus maxime faciundis, ut spatia ista morasque non sentiam.
Vero cum mihi de Graeco paene ad verbum forent antiquissima interpretanda
cannina, fateor affectavi equidem ut in verbis obsoletam vetustatem, sic in
mensura ipsa et numero gratam quandam ut speravi novitatem." Ep. lib. 1.
Baptist® Guarino.

3 Fitter left untold.'] Che'l tacere e bello.

So our Poet, in Canzone 14 : La vide in parte che'l tacere e bello.

Ruccellai, Le Api, 789 : Ch' a dire e brutto ed a tacerlo e bello.

And Bembo : Vie piu bello e il tacerle, che il favellarne. Gli Asol. lib. 1.

103—127. HELL, Canto IV. 21

Defended by a pleasant stream. O'er this

As o'er dry land we pass'd. Next, through seven gates,

I with those sages enter'd, and we came

Into a mead with lively verdure fresh.

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 x of the plain
Were shown me the great spirits, by whose sight
I am exalted in my own esteem.

Electra 2 there I saw accompanied
By many, among whom Hector I knew,
Anchises' pious son, and with hawk's eye
Caesar 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 3 and Cornelia there ;
And sole apart retired, the Soldan fierce.4

Then when a little more I raised my brow,

1 Green enamel.'] "Verde smalto." Dante here uses a metaphor that has
since become very common in poetry.

O'er the smooth enamel'd green. Milton, Arcades.

"Enameling, and perhaps pictures in enamel, were common in the middle
ages," etc. Warton, Hist. of Eng. Poetry, vol. i. cap. xiii. p. 376. "This art
flourished most at Limoges, in France. So early as the year 1197, we have duas
tabulas ameas superauratas de labore Limogise. Chart, aim. 1197 apud Ughelin.
torn. vii. Ital. Sacr. p. 1274." Warton, ibid. Additions to vol. i. printed in
vol. ii. Compare Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting in England, vol. i. cap. ii.

- Electra.~] The daughter of Atlas, and mother of Dardanus, the founder of
Troy. See Virg. JEn. lib. 8. 134, as referred to by Dante in the treatise De
Monarchic, lib. 2. "Electra, scilicet, nata magni nominis regis Atlantis, ut
de ambobus testimonium reddit poeta noster in octavo, ubi iEneas ad Evandrum
sic ait, 'Dardanus Iliacae,' etc."

3 Julia.] The daughter of Julius Caesar, and wife of Pompey.

4 The Soldan fierce.] Saladin, or Salaheddin, the rival of Richard Coeur de
Lion. See D'Herbelot, Bibl. Orient., the Life of Saladin, by Bohao'edin Ebn
Shedad, published by Albert Schultens, with a Latin translation ; and Knolles's
Hist, of the Turks, p. 57 to 73. " About this time (1193) died the great Sultan
Saladin, the greatest terror of the Christians, who, mindful of man's fragility
and the vanity of worldly honours, commanded at the time of his death no
solemnity to be used at his burial, but only his shirt, in manner of an ensign,
made fast unto the point of a lance, to be carried before his dead body as an
ensign, a plain priest going before, and crying aloud unto the people in this
sort, ' Saladin, Conqueror of the East, of ail the greatness and riches he had in
his life, carrieth not with him anything more than his shirt.' A sight worthy
so great a king, as wanted nothing to his eternal commendation more than the

22 THE VISION. 128—140.

I spied the master of the sapient throng,1
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,2 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,3 and him who made

true knowledge of his salvation in Christ Jesus. He reigned about sixteen
years with great honour." He is introduced by Petrarch in the Triumph of
Fame, c. ii. ; and by Boccaccio in the Decameron, G. x. N. 9.

1 The master of the sapient throng. ] Maestro di color che sanno. Aristotle.
— Petrarch assigns the first place to Plato. See Triumph of Fame, c. iii.
Volsimi da man manca, e vidi Plato
Che 'n quella schiera ando piu presso al segno
A qual aggiunge, a chi dal cielo e dato.
Aristotile poi pien d' alto ingegno.

Pulci, in his Morgante Maggiore, c. xviii. says,
Tu se' il maestro di color che sanno.
The reverence in which the Stagirite was held by our author cannot bo
better shown than by a passage in his Convito, p. 142: "Che Aristotile sia
degnissimo," etc. " That Aristotle is most worthy of trust and obedience,
may be thus proved. Amongst the workmen or artificers of different arts
and operations, which are in order to some final art or operation, he, who is
the artist or operator in that, ought chietly to be obeyed and trusted by the
rest, as being the one who alone considers the ultimate end of all the other
ends. Thus he, who exercises the occupation of a knight, ought to be obeyed
by the sword-cutler, the bridle-maker, the armourer, and by all those trades
which are in order to the occupation of a knight. And because all human
operations respect a certain end, which is that of human life, to which man,
inasmuch as he is man, is ordained, the master or artist, who considers of and
teaches us that, ought chiefly to be obeyed and trusted : now this is no other
than Aristotle ; and he is therefore the most deserving of trust and obedience."

2 Democritus,

Who sets the world at chance.]
Democritus, who maintained the world to have been formed by the fortuitous
concourse of atoms.

3 Avicen.] See D'Herbelot Bill. Orient, article Sina. He died in 1050.
Pulci here again imitates our Poet :

Avicenna quel che il sentimento
Intese di Aristotile e i segreti,

Averrois che fece il gran comento. Morg. Mag. c. xxv.

Chaucer, in the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, makes the Doctour of
Phisike familiar with

Avicen,

Averrois.

Sguarda Avicenna mio con tre corone,
Ch' egli fu Prence, e di scienza pieno,
E util tanto all' umane persone. Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. ix.

141—148. HELL, Canto V. 23

That commentary vast, Averroes.1

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.

Jtrfitttiunt.

Coming into the second circle of Hell, Dante at the entrance beholds Minos
the Infernal Judge, by whom he is admonished to beware how he enters
those regions. Here he witnesses the punishment of carnal sinners, who

Fuit Avicenna vir summi ingenii, magnus Philosophus, excellens medicus,
et summus apud suos Theologus. Sebastian Scheffer, Introd. in Artem
Medicam, p. 63, as quoted in the Historical Observations on the Quadriregio
Ediz. 1725.

1 Him who made

That commentary vast, Averroes.]

II gran Platone, e V altro che sta attento
Mirando il cielo, e sta a lui a lato
Averrois, che fece il gran comento.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. ix.

Averroes, called by the Arabians Roschd, translated and commented the
works of Aristotle. According to Tiraboschi (Storia delta Lett. I tat. t. v. lib. 2.
g. ii. sec. 4) he was the source of modern philosophical impiety. The critic
quotes some passages from Petrarch (Senil. lib. 5. ep. iii. et Oper. v. ii. p. 1143)
to show how strongly such sentiments prevailed in the time of that poet, by
whom they were held in horror and detestation. He adds, that this fanatic
admirer of Aristotle translated his writings with that felicity, which might be
expected from one who did not know a syllable of Greek, and who was there-
fore compelled to avail himself of the unfaithful Arabic versions. D'Herbelot,
on the other hand, informs us, that "Averroes was the first who translated
Aristotle from Greek into Arabic, before the Jews had made their translation ;
and that we had for a long time no other text of Aristotle, except that of the
Latin translation, which was made from this Arabic version of this great
philosopher (Averroes), who afterwards added to it a very ample commentary,
of which Thomas Aquinas, and the other scholastic writers, availed themselves,
before the Greek originals of Aristotle and his commentators were known to
us in Europe." According to D'Herbelot, he died in 1198 : but Tiraboschi
places that event about 1206. "Averroes," says Warton, "as the Asiatic
schools decayed by the indolence of the Caliphs, was one of those philosophers
who adorned the Moorish schools erected in Africa and Spain. He was a
professor in the University of Morocco. He wrote a commentary on all
Aristotle's works. He was styled the most Peripatetic of all the Arabian
writers. He was born at Cordova, of an ancient Arabic family." Hist, of
Eng. Poetry, vol. i. sec. 17, p. 441.

24 . THE VISION. 1-39.

are tost about ceaselessly in the dark air by the most furious winds.
Amongst these, he meets with Francesca of Rimini, through pity at whose
sad tale he falls fainting to the ground.

From the first circle 1 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 : 2 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
Alway a numerous throng ; and in his turn
Each one to judgment passing, speaks, and hears
His fate, thence downward to his dwelling hurl'd.

" 0 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
Deceive thee to thy harm." To him my guide :
" Wherefore exclaimest ? Hinder not his way
By destiny appointed ; so 'tis will'd,
AVhere 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
Where 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,
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

1 From the first ■circle.'] Chiabrera's twenty-first sonnet is on a painting, by
Cesare Corte, from this Canto. Mr. Fuseli, a much greater name, has lately
employed his wonder-working pencil on the same subject.

2 Grinning with ghastly feature.] Hence Milton :

Death

Grinn'd horrible a ghastly smile. P. L. b. 2. 845,

40—62. HELL, Canto V. 25

Keason 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,1

Chanting their dolorous notes, traverse the sky,

Stretch'd out in long array ; so I beheld

Spirits, who came loud wailing, hurried 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 2 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 ; 3

And held the land, which now the Soldan rules.

The next in amorous fury slew herself,

And to Sicheus' ashes broke her faith :

Then follows Cleopatra, lustful queen."

1 As cranes.] This simile is imitated by Lorenzo de Medici, in his Ambra,
a poem, first published by Mr. Roscoe,in the Appendix to his Life of Lorenzo:

Marking the tracts of air, the clamorous cranes
Wheel their due flight in varied ranks descried ;
And each with outstretch'd neck his rank maintains,
In marshal'd order through the ethereal void.

Roscoe, vol. i. c. v. p. 257, 4to edit.

Compare Homer, II. iii. 3 ; Virgil, d&n. lib. 10. 264 ; Oppian, Halieut. lib. 1.
620 ; Ruccellai, Le Api, 942 ; and Dante's Purgatory, xxiv. 63.

2 Liking.] His lustes were as law in his degree.

Chaucer, Monlce's Tale. Nero.

3 That she succeeded Ninus her espoused.]

Che succedette a Nino e fu sua sposa.

M. Artaud, in his Histoire de Dante, p. 589, mentions a manuscript work
called Attacanti's Quadragesimale de reditu peccatoris ad Deum, in which the
line is thus cited :

Che sugger dette a Nino e fu sua sposa.
"Who suckled Ninus, and was his wife."

This remarkable reading had been before noticed by Federici, Intorno ad
alcunevarianti nel testo della Divina C'ommedia, ed. Milan, 1836. Seethe Biblio
teca Jtaliana, torn, lxxxii. p. 282. It appears from the treatise De Monarchic
(lib. 2.) that Dante derived Ins knowledge of Assyrian history from his favourite
author Orosius (lib. 1. c. iv.), who relates that Semiramis both succeeded Ninus
through the artifice of personating her son, and that she committed incest with
her son ; but as the name other husband Ninus only is there recorded, and as
other historians call the son Ninias, it is probable that the common reading is
right.

26 THE VISION. G3— 99.

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
"Was lost ; and I began : " Bard ! 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 towards us, I thus framed my speech :
" 0 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 Dido ranks,
They, through the ill air speeding : with such force
My cry prevail'd, by strong affection urged.

" 0 gracious creature and benign ! who go'st
Visiting, through this element obscure,1
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,2 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,3

i Element obscure.] " L'aer perso." Much is said by the commentators
concerning the exact sense of the word "perso." It cannot be explained in
clearer terms than those used by Dante himself in his Convito : "11 perso i*
un colore misto di purpureo e nero, ma vince il nero," p. 185. " It is a
colour mixed of purple and black, but the black prevails." The word recurs
several times in this poem. Chaucer also uses it, in the Prologue to the
Canterbury Tales, Doctour of Phisike :

In sanguin and in perse he clad was alle.

2 The land.] Ravenna.

3 Love, that in gentle heart is quickly learnt.]

Amor, ch'al cor gentil ratto s'apprende.
A line taken by Marino, Adone, c. cxli. st. 251.

100-113. HELL, Canto V. 27

Entangled him by that fair form, from me
Ta'en in such cruel sort, as grieves me still :
Love, that denial takes from none beloved,1
Caught me with pleasing him so passing well,
That, as thou seest, he yet deserts me not.
Love brought us to one death : Caina 2 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 :
u What art thou pondering 1 " I in answer thus :
11 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 : " Francesca ! 3 your sad fate

That the reader of the original may not be misled as to the exact sense of
the word " s'apprende," which I have rendered "is learnt," it may be right
to apprise him that it signifies " is caught," and that it is a metaphor from a
thing taking fire. Thus it is used by Guido Guinicelli, whom indeed our
Poet seems here to have had in view :

Fuoco d'Amore in gentil cor s'apprende,
Come vertute in pietra preziosa.
Sonetti, etc., di diversi Antichi Toscani, ediz. Giunti, 1527, lib. 9. p. 107.
The fire of love in gentle heart is caught,
As virtue in the precious stone.

1 Love, that denial takes from none beloved.]

Amor, ch' a null' amato amar perdona.

So Boccaccio, in his Filocopo, 1. 1.

Amore mai non perdono l'amore a nullo amato.

And Pulci, in the Morgante Maggiore, c. iv.

E perche amor mal volontier perdona,
Che non sia al fin sempre amato chi ama.

Indeed many of the Italian poets have repeated this verse.

2 Caina.] The place to which murderers are doomed.

3 Francesca.] Francesca, daughter of Guido da Polenta, lord of Ravenna,
was given by her father in marriage to Lanciotto, son of Malatesta, lord of
Rimini, a man of extraordinary courage, but deformed in his person. His
brother Paolo, who unhappily possessed those graces which the husband of
Francesca wanted, engaged her affections ; and being taken in adultery, they
were both put to death by the enraged Lanciotto. See Notes to Canto xxvii.
v. 38 and 43. Troya relates, that they were buried together ; and that three
centuries after, the bodies were found at Rimini, whither they had been
removed from Pesaro, with the silken garments yet fresh. Veltro Allegorico
di Dante, ediz. 1826, p. 33. The whole of this passage is alluded to by
Petrarch, in his Triumph of Love, c. iii. :

Ecco quei che le carte empion di sogni
Lancilotto Tristan o e gli altri erranti :
Onde convien che '1 vulgo errante agogni ;
Vedi Ginevra, Isotta e l'altre amanti ;
E la coppia d'Arimino che 'nsieme
Vanno facendo dolorosi pianti.
Mr. Leigh Hunt has expanded the present episode into a beautiful poem,
in his Story of Rimini.

28 THE VISION. 114—138.

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.1 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,2

How him love thrall'd. Alone we were, and no

Suspicion near us. Oft-times by that reading

Our eyes were drawn together, and the hue

Fled from our alter'd cheek. But at one point 3

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

We read no more."4 While thus one spirit spake.

The other wail'd so sorely, that heart-struck

I, through compassion fainting, seem'd not far

From death, and like a corse fell to the ground.5

1 No greater grief than to remember days
Of joy, when misery is at hand.]

Imitated by Chaucer :
For of Fortunis sharp adversite A man to have been in prosperite,

The worste kind of infortune is this, And it remembir when it passkl is.

Rv Miri o • Troilus and Creseide, b. 3.

Che non ha doglia il misero maggiore,

Che ricordar la gioia entro il dolore. Adone, c. xiv. st. 100.
And by Fortiguerra :

Eimembrare il ben perduto

Fa piu meschino lo presente stato. Ricciardetto, c. xi. st. 83.
The original, perhaps, was in Bo'etius de Consol. Philosoph. " In omni ad-
versitate fortunae infelicissimum genus est infortunii fuisse felicem et non esse."
Lib. 2. pr. 4. Boetius, and Cicero de Amicitia, were the two first books that
engaged the attention of Dante, as he himself tells us in the Convito, p. 68.

a Lancelot.] One of the Knights of the Round Table, and the lover of
Ginevra, or Guinever, celebrated in romance. 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.

3 At one point.] Questo quel punto fix, che sol mi vinse.

4 _ In its leaves that day Tasso, II Torrismondo, act i. BC 3.

We read no more.] Nothing can exceed the delicacy with which Francesca
in these words intimates her guilt.

5 And like a corse fell to the ground.]

E caddi, come corpo morto cade.
So Pulci : E cadde come morto in terra cade. Morgante Maggiore, c. xxii.
And Ariosto : E cada, come corpo morto cade. Orl. Fur. c. ii. st. 55.
" And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead." Revelation, i. 17.

1-21 HELL, Canto VI. 29

CANTO VI.

Argument.

On his recovery, the Poet finds himself in the third circle, where the glut-
tonous are punished. Their torment is, to lie in the mire, under a con-
tinual and heavy storm of hail, snow, and discoloured 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 Florence is about to be distracted. Dante pro-
poses a question to his guide, who solves it ; and they proceed towards the
fourth circle.

My sense reviving,1 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, discolour^ water, sleety flaw
Through the dun midnight air streain'd clown 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 worm2

1 My sense reviving.] Al tornar della mente, che si chiuse,

Dinanzi alia pieta de' duo cognati.

Berni has made a sportive application of these lines, in his Orl. Inn. lib. 3.
c. viii. st. 1.

2 That great worm.'] Juxta — infernum vermis erat infinitse magnitudinis
ligatus maxima catena. Alberici Visio, sec. 9.

In Canto xxxiv. Lucifer is called

The abhorred worm, that boreth through the world.

This is imitated by Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xlvi. st. 76. Shakspeare, Milton,
and Cowper, who well understood that the most common words are often the
most impressive, have used the synonymous term in our language with the
best effect ; as Pindar has done in Greek :

Ato TxvyiTov fjt.it Aoexxivav

Heyne's Pindar. Fragm. F.jjuuc. ii. 2. In Hieron.

30 THE VISION. 22—64.

Descried us, savage Cerberus, he oped

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. " 0 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 Ciacco.1 For the sin
Of gluttony, damned vice, beneath 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
Of the divided city ;2 whether any
Just one in habit there : and tell the cause,
Whence jarring Discord hath assail'd it thus."

He then : " After long striving they will come

1 Ciacco.] So called from his inordinate appetite; Ciacco, in Italian, sig-
nifying a pig. The real name of this glutton has not been transmitted to us.
He is introduced in Boccaccio's Decameron, Giorn. ix. Nov. 8.

2 The divided city.] The city of Florence, divided into the Bianchi and Neri
factions.

65—83. HELL, Canto VI. 31

To blood ; and the wild party from the woods 1

Will chase the other2 with much injury forth.

Then it behoves that this must fall,3 within

Three solar circles ; 4 and the other rise

By borrow'd force of one, who under shore

Now rests.5 It shall a long space hold aloof

Its forehead, keeping under heavy weight

The other opprest, indignant at the load,

And grieving sore. The j ust are two in number,6

But they neglected. Avarice, envy, pride,7

Three fatal sparks, have set the hearts of all

On fire." Here ceased the lamentable sound ;

And I continued thus : " Still would I learn

More from thee, further parley still entreat.

Of Farinata and Tegghiaio 8 say,

They who so well deserved ; of Giacopo,9

Arrigo, Mosca,10 and the rest, who bent

Their minds on working good. Oh ! tell me where

They bide, and to their knowledge let me come.

1 The xoild party from the woods.'] So called, because it was headed by Veri
de' Cerchi, whose family had lately come into the city from Acone, and the
woody country of the Val di Nievole.

2 The other.] The opposite party of the Neri, at the head of which was Corso
Donati.

3 This must fall.] The Bianchi.

4 Three solar circles.] Three years.
5 Of one, who under shore

Noio rests. ]
Charles of Valois, by whose means the Neri were replaced.

6 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. But this would argue a presumption, which our Poet himself else-
where contradicts ; for, in the Purgatory, he owns his consciousness of not
being exempted from one at least of " the three fatal sparks, which had set the
hearts of all on fire." See Canto xiii. 126. Others refer the encomium to
Barduccio and Giovanni Vespignano, adducing the following passage from
Villani in support of their opinion: "In the year 1331 died in Florence two
just and good men, of holy life and conversation, and bountiful in almsgiving,
although laymen. The one was named Barduccio, and was buried in S.
Spirito, in the place of the Frati Komitani : the other, named Giovanni da
Vespignano, was buried in S. Pietro Maggiore. And by each, God showed
open miracles, in healing the sick and lunatic after divers manners ; and for
each there was ordained a solemn funeral, and many images of wax set up in
discharge of vows that had been made. G. Villani, lib. 10. cap. clxxix.

7 Avarice, envy, pride.] Invidia, superbia ed avarizia

Vedea moltiplicar tra miei figliuoli.
Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 1. cap. xxix.

8 Of Farinata and Tegghiaio.] See Canto x. and Notes, and Canto xvi. and
Notes.

9 Giacopo.] Giacopo Rusticucci. See Canto xvi. and Notes.

10 Arrigo, Mosca.] Of Arrigo, who is said by the commentators to have been
of the noble family of the Fifanti, no mention afterwards occurs. Mosca degli
Uberti, or de' Lamberti. is introduced in Canto xxviii.

32 THE VISION. 84—117.

For I am prest with keen desire to hear
If 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,
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 l 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,2 though slightly, on the life to come.
For thus I questi on'd : "Shall these tortures, Sir !
"When the great sentence passes, be increased,
Or mitigated, or as now severe ? "

He then : " Consult thy knowledge ; 3 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 I relate, between us pass'd :
Till at the point, whence the steps led below,
Arrived, there Plutus, the great foe, we found.

1 Resume.] Imitated by Frezzi : —

Allor ripiglieran la carne e l'ossa ;
Li rei oscuri, e i buon con splendori
Per la virtu clella divina possa. II Quadr. lib. 4. cap. xv.

2 Touching.] Conversing, though in a slight and superficial manner, on the
life to come.

3 Consult thy knowledge.] We are referred to the following passage in St.
Augustin : — " Cum net resurrectio carnis, et bonorum gaudia et malorum
tormenta majora erunt." — "At the resurrection of the flesh, both the happi-
ness of the good and the torments of the wicked will be increased."

1—17. HELL, Canto VII. 33

CANTO VII.

Argument.

Iu the present Canto, Dante describes his descent into 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.

" Ah me ! 0 Satan ! Satan ! " 1 loud exclaim'd

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." 2

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

1 Ah me I 0 Satan/ Satan!] Pape Satan, pape Satan, aleppe.

Pape is said by the commentators to be the same as the Latin word papa;,
" strange ! " Of aleppe they do not give a more satisfactory account. See the
Life of Benvenuto Cellini, translated by Dr. Nugent, v. ii. b. 3. cap. vii. p. 113,
where he mentions " having heard the words, Paix, paix, Satan I allez, paix !
in the courts of justice at Paris. I recollected what Dante said, when he with
his master Virgil entered the gates of hell : for Dante, and Giotto the painter,
were together in France, and visited Paris with particular attention, where the
court of justice may be considered as hell. Hence it is that Dante, who was
likewise perfect master of the French, made use of that expression ; and I
have often been surprised that it was never understood in that sense."

2 The first adulterer proud.] Satan. The word "fornication," or
"adultery," "strupo," is here used for a revolt of the affections from God,
according to the sense in which it is often applied in Scripture. But Monti,
following Grassi's Essay on Synonymes, supposes "strupo" to mean
"troop ;" the word "strup" being still used in the Piemontese dialect for
"a flock of sheep," and answering to "troupeau" in French. In that case,
"superbo strupo" would signify "the troop of rebel angels who sinned
through pride."

C

34 THE VISION. 18—49.

Hems in of all the universe. Ah me !
Almighty Justice ! in what store thou heap'st x
New pains, new troubles, as I here beheld.
"Wherefore doth fault of ours bring us to this 1

E'en as a billow,2 on Charybdis rising,
Against encountered billow dashing breaks ;
Such is the dance this wretched race must lead,
Whom more than elsewhere numerous here I found.
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
Koll'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,
Both turn'd them round, and through the middle space
Conflicting met again. At sight whereof
I, stung with grief, thus spake : " 0 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,3 o'er whom
Avarice dominion absolute maintains."

1 In what store thou heap'st.'] Some understand " chi stipa " to mean either
"who can imagine," or "who can describe the torments," etc. I have
followed Landino, whose words, though very plain, seem to have been mis-
taken by Lombardi : "Chi stipa, chi accumula, ed insieme raccoglie ; quasi
dica, tu giustizia aduni tanti supplicii."

2 E en as a oillmv.]

As when two billows in the Irish sowndes,
Forcibly driven with contrarie tides,
Do meet together, each aback rebounds
With roaring rage, and dashing on all sides,
That filleth all the sea with foam, divides
The doubtful current into divers waves.

Spenser, F. Q. b. 4. c. i. st. 42.

3 Popes and Cardinals.] Ariosto, having personified Avarice as a strange
and hideous monster, says of her —

Peggio facea nella Romana corte,

Che v'avea uccisi Cardiuali e Papi. Orl. Fur. c. xxvi. st. 32.

Worse did she in the Court of Rome, for there

She. had slain Popes and Cardinals.

50— 8G. HELL, Canto VII. 35

I then : " 'Mid such as these some needs must he,
Whom I shall recognise, 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 laboured 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,
Or ever hath been, of these toil-worn souls
Might purchase rest for one." I thus rejoin'd :
" My guide ! of thee 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 : " 0 beings blind ! what ignorance
Besets you ! Now my j udgment hear and mark.
He, whose transcendent wisdom 2 passes all,
The heavens creating, gave them ruling powers
To guide them ; so that each part 3 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

1 Xot all the gold.] Tutto l'oro ch' e sotto la luna.

For all the gode under the colde mone.

Chaucer, Legende of Hypermnestra.

2 He, whose transcendent wisdom.] Compare Frezzi : —

Dio e primo prince in ogni parte

Serapre e di tutto, etc. II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. ii.

3 Each part.] Each hemisphere of the heavens shines upon that hemisphere
of the earth which is placed under it.

4 General minister.] Lombardi cites an apposite passage from Augustin,
Be Civitate Dei, lib. 5. : — " Nos eas causas, qua dicuntur fortuitie (unde etiam
fortuna nomen accepit) non dicimus nullas, sed latentes, easque tribuimus, vel
vcri Dei, vel quorumlibet spirituum voluntati."

3G THE VISION. 87-117.

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 x

She is made swift, so frequent come who claim

Succession in her favours. This is she,

So execrated e'en fay those whose defat

To her is rather praise : they wrongfully

With falame 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 2 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

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,3 beneath.

Into a lake, the Stygian named, expands

The dismal stream, when it hath reach'd the foot

Of the grey 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.

1 By necessity.'] This sentiment called forth the reprehension of Francesco
Stabili, commonly called Cecco d'Ascoli, in his Acerba, lib. 1. c. i.

In cio peccasti, 0 Fiorentin poeta,
Ponendo che li ben della fortuna
Necessitati sieno con lor meta.
Non e fortuna, cui ragion non vinca.
Or pensa Dante, se prova nessnna
Si pud piu fare che questa convinca.

Herein, 0 bard of Florence, didst thou err,
Laying it down that fortune's largesses
Are fated to their goal. Fortune is none,
That reason cannot conquer. Mark thou, Dante,
If any argument may gainsay this.

2 Each star.] So Boccaccio : " Giu ogni stella a cader comincio, che salia."
Dec. G. iii. at the end.

3 A different track.] Una via diversa. Some understand this "a strange
path ; " as the word is used in the preceding Canto ; " fiera crudele e diversa."
" monster fierce and strange ; " and in the Vita Nuova, " visi diversi ed orribili
a vedere," "visages strange and horrible to see."

118—134. HELL, Canto Vrlll. 37

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 hubbies 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.

CANTO VIII.

Qtpxxatnt

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.

My theme pursuing,1 I relate, that ere
We reach'd the lofty turret's base, our eyes
Its height ascended, where we mark'd unhung
Two cressets, and another saw from far

1 My theme pursuing.] It is related -by some of the early commentators,
that the seven preceding Cantos were found at Florence after our Poet's
banishment, by some one who was searching over his papers, which were left
in that city ; that by this person they were taken to Dino Frescobaldi ; and
that he, being much delighted with them, forwarded them to the Marchese
Morello Malaspina, at whose entreaty the poem was resumed. This account,
though very circumstantially related, is rendered improbable by the prophecy
of Ciacco in the sixth Canto, which must have been written after the events to
which it alludes. The manner in which the present Canto opens furnishes
no'proof of the truth of the report ; for, as Maffei remarks in his Ossrrrazioni
Letterarie, torn. ii. p. 249, referred to by Lombardi, it might as well be
affirmed that Ariosto was interrupted in his Orlando Furioso, because he begins
c. xvi.

Dico la bella storia ripigliando.
And c. xxii

Ma tornando al lavor, che vario ordisco.

38 THE VISION. 5—44.

Keturn 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 1 "

" There on the filthy waters," he replied,
" E'en now what next awaits us mayst thou see,
If the marsh-gender'd 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,1
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.

While we our course 2 o'er the dead channel held,
One drench'd in mire before me came, and said :
"Who art thou, that thus comest ere thine hour?"

I answer'd : " Though I come, I tarry not :
But who art thou, that art become so foul ? "

" One, as thou seest, who mourn : " he straight replied.

To which I thus : " In mourning and in woe,
Curst spirit ! 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 other dogs ! " then, with his arms my neck
Encircling, kiss'd my cheek, and spake : " 0 soul,
Justly disdainful ! blest was she in whom
Thou wast conceived.3 He in the world was one

1 Phlegyas.'] Phlegyas, who was so incensed against Apollo, for having
violated his daughter Coronis, that he set fire to the temple of that deity, by
whose vengeance he was cast into Tartarus. See Virg. ^En. lib. 6. 618.

2 While we our course.'] Solcando noi per quella morta gora.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. vii.

3 « In whom

Thou wast conceived.] "Che'n te s'incinse." Several of the commenta-
tors have stumbled at this word, which is the same as "enceinte " in French,
and "inciens" in Latin. For many instances, in which it is thus used, see
the Notes on Boccaccio's Decameron, p. 101, in the Giunti edition, 1573.

45—82. HELL, Canto VIII. 39

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 behind 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 ! ';1 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 near the city, that of Dis is named,2
With its grave denizens, a mighty throng."

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.3 With ireful gestures, " Who is this,"
They cried, "that, without death first felt, goes through

1 Filippo Argenti.'] Boccaccio tells us, "he was a man remarkable for the
large proportions and extraordinary vigour of his bodily frame, and the
extreme waywardness and irascibility of his temper." Decam. G. ix. N. 8.

2 The city, that of Dis is named.'] So Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xl. st. 32 :

Fatto era un stagno piu sicuro e brutto,
Di quel che cinge la citta di Dite.

3 From heaven

Were shmver'd.] Da ciel piovuti.
Thus Frezzi :

Li maladetti piovuti da cielo. II Quadr. lib. 4. cap. iv.

And Pulci, in the passage cited in the Note to c. xxi. 117.

40 THE VISION. 83—117.

The regions of the dead ? " My sapient guide

Made sign that he for secret parley wish'd ;

Whereat their angry scorn abating, thus

They spake : " Come thou alone ; and let him go,

Who hath so hardily enter'd this realm.

Alone return he by his witless way ;

If well he know 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 x
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,
Keplied : " Fear not : for of our passage none
Hath power to disappoint us, by such high
Authority permitted. But do thou
Expect me here ; meanwhile, thy wearied spirit
Comfort, and feed with kindly hope, assured
I will not leave thee in this lower world."

This said, departs the sire benevolent,
And quits me. Hesitating I remain
At war, 'twixt will and will not,2 in my thoughts.

I could not hear what terms he offer'd them,
But they conferr'd not long, for all at once
Pellmell 3 rush'd back within. Closed were the gates,
By those our adversaries, on the breast
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 :

1 Seven times."] The commentators, says Venturi, perplex themselves with
the inquiry what seven perils these were from which Dante had been delivered
by Virgil. Reckoning the beasts in the first Canto as one of them, and adding
Charon, Minos, Cerberus, Plutus, Phlegyas, and Filippo Argenti, as so many
others, we shall have the number ; and if this be not satisfactory, we may
suppose a determinate to have been put for an indeterminate number.

2 At war, 'twixt will and will not.} Che si, e no nel capo mi tenzona.
Thus our Poet in his eighth Canzone :

Ch' il si, e'l n6 tututto in vostra mauo
Ha posto amore.

And Boccaccio, Ninf. Fiesol. st. 233 : II si e il no nel capo gli contende.

The words I have adopted as a translation are Shakspeare's, Measure for
Measure, act ii. sc. 1.

3 Pellmell.] A pruova. "Certatim." "A l'envi." I had before trans-
lated " To trial ; " and have to thank Mr. Carlyle for detecting the error.

118—128. HELL, Canto IX. 41

" Who hath denied me these abodes of woe 1 "

Then thus to me : " 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,1

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."

CANTO IX.

Argument.

After some hindrances, 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 onwards between the sepulchres
and the walls of the city.

• The hue,2 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."

I 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,

1 This their insolence, not new.] Virgil assures our Poet, that these evil
spirits had formerly shown the same insolence when our Saviour descended into
hell. They attempted to prevent him from entering at the gate, over which
Dante had read the fatal inscription. "That gate which," says the Koman
poet, " an angel had just passed, by whose aid we shall overcome this oppo-
sition, and gain admittance into the city."

2 The kite.] Virgil, perceiving that Dante was pale with fear, restrained
those outward tokens of displeasure which his own countenance had betrayed.

42 THE VISION. 16—44.

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. " Barely," he replied,
" It chances, that among us any makes
This journey, which I wend. Erewhile, 'tis true,
Once came I here beneath, conjured by fell
Erictho,1 sorceress, who compell'd the shades
Back to their bodies. No long space my flesh
Was naked of me,2 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
Farthest from heaven's all-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 3 crept
Instead of hair, and their fierce temples bound.

He, knowing well the miserable hags

1 Erictho.] Erictho, a Thessalian sorceress, according to Lucau, Pharsal.
lib. 6, was employed by Sextus, son of Pompey the Great, to conjure up
a spirit, who should inform him of the issue of the civil wars between his
father and Caesar.

2 No long space my flesh

Was naked of vie.']

Quse corpus complexa anima? tarn fortis inane. Ovid, Met. lib. 13. fab. 2.

Dante appears to have fallen into an anachronism. Virgil's death did not
happen till long after this period. But Lombardi shows, in opposition to the
other commentators, that the anachronism is only apparent. Erictho might
well have survived the battle of Pharsalia long enough to be employed in her
magical practices at the time of Virgil's decease.

3 Adders and cerastes.']

Vipereiim crinem vittis innexa cruentis. Virg. JEn. lib. 6. 281.

spinaque vagi torquente cerastse

******

* * et torrida dipsas
Et gravis in geminum vergens caput amphisbsena.

Lucan, Pharsal. lib. 9. 719.
So Milton : Scorpion and asp, and amphisbsena dire,
Cerastes horn'd, hydras and elops drear,
And dipsas. P. L. b. 10. 524.

45—75. HULL, Canto IX. 43

Who tend the queen of endless woe, thus spake :

" Mark thou each dire Erynnis. To the left,

This is Megaera ; on the right hand, she

Who wails, Alecto ; and Tisiphone

F th' midst." This said, in silence he remain'd.

Their breast they each one clawing tore ; themselves

Smote with their palms, and such thrill clamour raised,

That to the bard I clung, suspicion-bound.

11 Hasten Medusa : so to adamant

Him shall we change ; " all looking down exclaim'd :

" E'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 1 conceal'd

Under close texture of the mystic strain.

And now there came o'er the perturbed waves
Loud-crashing, terrible, a sound that made
Either shore tremble, as if of a wind 2
Impetuous, from conflicting vapours sprung,
That 'gainst some forest driving all his might,
Plucks off the branches, beats them down, and hurls
Afar ; 3 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

1 The lore.] The Poet probably intends to call the reader's attention to the
allegorical and mystic sense of the present Canto, and not, as Venturi supposes,
to that of the whole work. Landinc supposes this hidden meaning to be, that
in the case of those vices which proceed from incontinence and intemperance,
reason, which is figured under the person of Virgil, with the ordinary grace of
God, may be a sufficient safeguard ; but that in the instance of more heinous
crimes, such as those we shall hereafter see punished, a special grace, repre-
sented by the angel, is requisite for our defence.

2 A wind.] Imitated by Berni :

Com' un gruppo di vento in la marina

L' onde, e le navi sottosopra caccia,

Ed in terra con furia repentina

Gli arbori abbatte, sveglie, sfronda e straccia.

Smarriti fuggon i lavoratori

E per le selve le fiere e' pastori. Orl. Inn. lib. 1. c. ii. st. 6.

3 Afar.] " Porta i fiori," " carries away the blossoms," is the common read-
ing. "Porta fuori." which is the right reading, adopted by Lombardi in bis
edition from the Nidobeatina, for which he claims it exclusively, I had also
seen in Landino's edition of 1484, and adopted from thence, long before it was
my chance to meet with Lombardi.

44 THE VISION. 76—111.

Before their roe 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 1 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,2 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,
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 Aries,3

1 With his xoand.]

She with her rod did softly smite the raile,

Which straight flew ope. Spenser, F. Q. b. 4. c. iii. st. 46.

2 Your Cerberus.'] Cerberus is feigned to have been dragged by Hercules,
bound with a threefold chain, of which, says the angel, he still bears the
marks. Lombardi blames the other interpreters for having supposed that the
angel attributes this exploit to Hercules, 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 encountered
him.

3 The plains of Aries.] In Provence. See Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xxxix.
st. 72 :

Fu da ogni parte in quest' ultima guerra
(Benche la cosa non lu ugual divisa,

112—131. HELL, Canto X. 45

Or as at Pola,1 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 scatter'd flames,

Wherewith intensely all throughout they burn'd,2

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.

I thus : " 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.

CANTO X.

QxQxtmznt

Dante, having obtained permission from his guide, holds discourse with
Farinata degli Uberti and Cavalcante Cavalcanti, who lie in their fiery
tombs, that are yet open, and not to be closed up till after the last judg-
ment. Farinata predicts the Poet's exile from Florence ; and shows him
that the condemned have knowledge of future things, but are ignorant of
what is at present passing, unless it be revealed by some new comer from
earth.

Now by a secret pathway we proceed,
Between the walls, that hem the region round,

Ch' assai piu andar dei Saracin sotterra
Per man di Bradamante e di Marfisa)
Se ne vede ancor segno in quella terra,
Che presso ad Arli, ove il Rodano stagna,
Piena di sepolture e la campagna.

These sepulchres are mentioned in the Life of Charlemagne, which goes under
the name of Archbishop Turpin, cap. xxviii. and xxx., and by Fazio degli Uberti,
Dttamondo, lib. 4. cap. xxi.

1 At Pola.] A city of Istria, situated near the gulf of Quarnaro, in the
Adriatic Sea.

2 They burn'd.] Mr. Darley observes, that in the " Incantation of Hervor "
(v. Northern Antquities, vol. ii.) the spirit of Angantyr lies in a tomb "all
on fire."

46 THE VISION. 3— 3a

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 1 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 2

Which thou conceal'st in silence." I replied :

" I keep not, guide beloved ! from thee my heart
Secreted, but to shun vain length of words ;
A lesson erewhile taught me by thyself."

" 0 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

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 3 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

1 Josaphat.] It seems to have been a 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 heritage 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
converse with the followers of Epicurus ; among whom, we shall see, were
Farinata degli Uberti and Cavalcante Cavalcanti.

3 Farinata.] Farinata degli Uberti, a noble Florentine, was the leader of
the Ghibelline faction, when they obtained a signal victory over the Guelfi
at Montaperto, near the river Arbia. Macchiavelli calls him "a man of
exalted soul, and great military talents." Hist, of Flor. b. 2. His grandson,
Bonifacio, or, as he is commonly called, Fazio degli Uberti, wrote a poem,
entitled the Dittamondo, in imitation of Dante. I shall have frequent occasion
to refer to it throughout these Notes. At the conclusion of cap. xxvii. lib. 2.
he makes mention of his ancestor Farinata. See Note to Life of Dante, p.

37—63. HELL, Canto X. 47

E'en bell. 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 I there 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,1 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,
Eose from his side a shade,2 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 ? 3 and wherefore not with thee ? "

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." 4 Already had his words

1 Twice.] The first time in 1248, when they were driven out by Frederick
the Second. See G. Villani, lib. 6. c. xxxiv. ; and the second time in 1260.
See Note to v. 83.

2 A shade.] The spirit of Cavalcante Cavalcanti, a noble Florentine, of the
Guelph party.

3 My son.] Guido, the son of Cavalcante Cavalcanti ; "he whom I call the
first of my friends," says Dante in his Vita Nuova, where the commencement
of their friendship is related. From the character given of him by contem-
porary writers, his temper was well formed to assimilate with that of our Poet.
"He was," according to G. Villani, lib. 8. c. xli., "of a philosophical and
elegant mind, if he had not been too delicate and fastidious." And Dino
Compagni terms him " a young and noble knight, brave and courteous, but of
a lofty, scornful spirit, much addicted to solitude and study." Muratori, Her.
Ital. Script, t. ix. lib. 1. p. 481. He died, either in exile at Serrazana, or soon
after his return to Florence, December 1300, during the spring of which year
the action of this poem is supposed to be passing.

4 Guido thy son

Had in contempt.] Guido Cavalcanti, being more given to philosophy
than poetry, was perhaps no great admirer of Virgil. Some poetical composi-
tions by Guido are, however, still extant ; and his reputation for skill in the art
was such as to eclipse that of his predecessor and namesake, Guido Guinicelli ;
as we shall see in the Purgatory, Canto xi. , in the Notes to which the reader will
find specimens of the poems that have been left by each of these writers. His
" Canzone sopra il Terreno Amore " was thought worthy of being illustrated by
numerous aud ample commentaries. Crescimbeni, 1st. della Volg. Poes. lib. 5.

48 THE VISION. G4-79.

And mode of punishment read me his name,
Whence I so fully answered. He at once
Exclaim'd, up starting, " How ! said'st thou, he had ? l
No longer lives he ? Strikes not on his eye
The blessed daylight ? " Then, of some delay
I made ere my reply, aware, down fell
Supine, nor after forth appear'd he more.

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 2 shall be relumed
Her aspect, who reigns here queen of this realm,3
Ere thou shalt know the full weight of that art.

Our author addressed him in a playful sonnet, of which the following spirited
translation is found in the Notes to Hayley's Essay on Epic Poetry, Ep. iii. :

Henry ! I wish that you, and Charles, and I,

By some sweet spell within a bark were placed,

A gallant bark with magic virtue graced,

Swift at our will with every wind to fly ;
So that no changes of the shifting sky,

No stormy terrors of the wat'ry waste,

Might bar our coast, but heighten still our taste

Of sprightly joy, and of our social tie :
Then that my Lucy, Lucy fair and free,

With those soft nymphs, on whom your souls are bent,

The kind magician might to us convey,
To talk of love throughout the live-long day ;

And that each fair might be as well content,

As I in truth believe our hearts would be.

The two friends, here called Henry and Charles, are, in the original, Guido
and Lapo, concerning the latter of whom see the Life of Dante prefixed : and
Lucy is Monna Bice. A more literal version of the sonnet may he found in the
'• Canzoniere of Dante, translated by Charles Lyell, Esq." 8vo, Lond. 1835,
p. 407.

1 SaioVst thou, he had ?] In ^Eschylus, the shade of Darius is represented as
inquiring with similar anxiety after the fate of his son Xerxes :

AtoSSa. Mov«&« Ss Bsj|»5V Ifi/MOv $«.<rti ov froXXav uirx —
Darius. TISs it 5>j *«/ x«7 TiXivrxv ; \<rri T.t traiTti^tx, ;

I1EP2AI, 741, Blomfield's Edit.

Atossa. Xerxes astonish'd, desolate, alone —

Ghost of Dar. How will this end ? Nay, pause not. Is he safe ?

The Persians, Potter's Translation.

2 Not yet fifty times.'] " Not fifty months shall be passed, before thou shalt
learn, by woeful experience, the difficulty of returning from banishment to thy
native city."

3 Queen of this realm.'] The moon, one of whose titles in heathen mythology,
was Proserpine, queen of the shades below.

80—93. HELL, Caxto X. 49

So to the pleasant world mayst thou return,1
As thou shalt tell nie why, in all their laws,
Against my kin this people is so fell."

"The slaughter2 and great havoc," I replied,
" That colour'd Arbia's Hood with crimson stain —
To these impute, that in our hallow'd dome
Such orisons3 ascend." Sighing he shook
The head, then thus resumed : " In that affray
I stood not singly, nor, without just cause,
Assuredly, should with the rest have stirr'd ;
But singly there I stood,4 when, by consent
Of all, Florence had to the ground been razed,
The one who openly forbade the deed."

" So may thy lineage 5 find at last repose,"

1 So to the pleasant world mayst thou return. "\

E se tu mai nel dolce moiido reggi.

Lombardi would construe this: "And if thou ever remain in the pleasant
world." His chief reasons for thus departing from the common interpretation,
are, first, that "se" in the sense of "so" cannot be followed by "mai," any
more than in Latin "sic" can be followed by "unquam;" and next, that
" reggi " is too unlike " riedi " to be put for it. A more intimate acquaintance
with the early Florentine writers would have taught him that " mai" is used
in other senses than those which " unquam " appears to have had, particularly
iu that of "pur," "yet;" as may be seen in the Notes to the Decameron,
p. 43, ed. Giunti, 1573 ; and that the old writers both of prose and verse
changed " riedo " into "reggio," as of "fiedo" they made "feggio." Inf. c.
xv. v. 39, and c. xvii. v. 75. See page 98 of the same Notes to the Decameron,
where a poet before Dante's time is said to have translated "Kedeuntflores,"
"Reggiono i fiori."

2 The slaughter.} "By means of Farinata degli Uberti, the Guelfi were
conquered by the army of king Manfredi, near the river Arbia, with so great a
slaughter, that those who escaped from that defeat took refuge, not in Florence,
which city they considered as lost to them, but in Lucca." Macchiavelli, Hist,
of Flor. b. 2. and G. Villani, lib. 6. cap. lxxx. and lxxxi.

3 Such orisons.] This appears to allude to certain prayers which were offered
up in the churches of Florence, for deliverance from the hostile attempts of
the Uberti : or, it may be, that the public councils being held in churches, the
speeches delivered in them against the Uberti are termed "orisons," or
prayers.

4 Singly there I stood.] Guido Novello assembled a council of the Ghibellini
at Empoli ; where it was agreed by all. that, in order to maintain the ascend-
ancy 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 the 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 Farinata degli Uberti, Avho 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. 2.

5 So may thy lineage.] Deh se riposi mai vostra semenza.

Here Lombardi is again mistaken, as at v. 80, above. Let me take this
occasion to apprise the reader of Italian poetry, that one not well versed in it
is very apt to misapprehend the word "se,"as I think Cowper has done in

D

50 THE VISION. 94—121.

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,1 as one who hath an evil sight,"
He answer'd, "plainly, objects far remote ;
So much of his large splendour 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,2 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.
Within is Frederick,3 second of that name,
And the Lord Cardinal ; 4 and of the rest

translating Milton's Italian verses. A good instance of the different meanings
in which it is used is afforded in the following lines by Bernardo Capello :

E tu, che dolcemente i fiori e 1' erba

Con lieve corso mormorando bagni,

Tranquillo flume di vaghezza pieno ;
Se'l cielo al mar si chiaro t' accompagni ;

Se punto di pietade in te si serba :

Le mie lagrirne aecogli entro al tuo seno.

Here the first " se " signifies " so," and the second " if."

1 We view.] "The departed spirits know things past and to come; yet
are ignorant of things present. Agamemnon foretells what should happen
unto Ulysses, yet ignorantly inquires what is become of his own son." Brown
on Urne Burial, c. iv.

2 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
that his son Guido was no longer living.

3 Frederick.] The Emperor Frederick the Second, who died in 1250. See
Notes to Canto xiii.

4 The Lord Cardinal.] Ottaviano Ubaldini, a Florentine, made cardinal in
1215, and deceased about 1273. On account of his great influence, he was
generally known by the appellation of "the Cardinal." It is reported of him,
that he declared, if there were any such thing as a human soul, he had lost his
for the Ghibellini. " I know not," says Tiraboschi, " whether it is on sufficient

122—138. HELL, Canto XL 51

I speak not." He, this said, from sight withdrew.

II ut I my steps toward the ancient bard
Reverting, ruminated on the words
Betokening me sueli ill. Onward he moved,

And thus, in going, questional : " Whence the amaze
That holds thy senses wrapt ? " 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,1
Whose bright eye all surveys, she of thy life
The future tenour will to thee unfold."

Forthwith he to the left hand turn'd his feet :
We left the wall, and towards the middle space
Went by a path that to a valley strikes,
Which e'en thus high exhaled its noisome steam.

CANTO XI.

^U'Qttmcttt.

Dante ai'rives at the verge of a rocky precipice which encloses the seventh
circle, where he sees the sepulchre of Anastasius the Heretic ; behind the
lid of which pausing a little, to make himself capable by degrees of endur-
ing 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 towards the place from whence a
passage leads down to the seventh circle.

Upon the utmost verge of a high bank,
By craggy rocks environ'd round, we came,
Where woes beneath, more cruel yet, were stow'd :
And here, to shun the horrible excess

grounds that Crescimbeni numbers among the poets of this age the Cardinal
Uttaviano, or Ottaviano degli Ubaldini, a Florentine, archdeacon and procurator
of the church of Bologna, afterwards made Cardinal by Innocent IV. in 1245,
and employed in the most important public affairs, wherein, however, he
showed himself, more than became his character, a favourer of the Ghibellines.
He died, not in the year 1272, as Ciaconio and other writers have reported, but
at soonest after the July of 1273, at which time he was in Mngello with Pope
Gregory X." Tiraboschi, Delia Poes. It. Mr. Mathias's Edit. t. i. p. 140.
1 Her (jracious beam.] Beatrice.

52 THE VISION. 5—40.

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 : " I have in charge

Pope Anastasius,1 whom Photinus drew

From the right path." — "Ere our descent, behoves

We make delay, that somewhat first the sense,

To the dire breath accustoin'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 ! 2 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
Either by force or fraud 3 works other's woe.
But fraud, because of man 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 neighbour, 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 neighbour 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

1 Pope Anastasius.] The commentators are not agreed concerning the
person who is here mentioned as a follower of the heretical Photinus. By
some he is supposed to have been Anastasius the Second ; by others, the
Fourth of that name ; while a third set, jealous of the integrity of the papal
faith, contend that our Poet has confounded him with Anastasius I., Emperor
of the East. Fazio degli Uberti, like our author, makes him a pope :

Anastasio papa in quel tempo era,

Di Fotin vago a mal grado de sui. Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xiv.

2 My son.'] The remainder of the present Canto may be considered u a
syllabus of the whole of this part of the poem.

3 Either by force or fraud.'] " Cum autem duobus modis, id est, aut vi, aut
fraude fiat injuria . . . utrumque homini alienissimum ; sed fraus odio digna
majore." Cic. De Ojf. lib. 1. cap. xiii.

41—82. HELL, Canto XI. 53

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 l 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,2 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
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 1 Dwell not in thy memory

1 And sorrmvs.] This fine moral, that not to enjoy our being is to he
ungrateful to the Author of it, is well expressed in Spenser, F. Q. b. 4. c. viii.
st. 15. :

For he whose daies in wilful woe are worne,

The grace of his Creator doth despise,

That will not use his gifts for thankless nigardise.

2 Cahors.~\ A city of Guienne, much frequented by usurers.

54 THE VISION. 83—112.

The words, wherein thy ethic page x 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 j udgment, 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."
" 0 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,
How imitative Nature takes her course
From the celestial mind, and from its art :
And where her laws 2 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
In his instructor's step ; so that your art
Deserves the name of second in descent 3
From God. These two, if thou recall to mind
Creation's holy book,4 from the beginning
Were the right source of life and excellence

1 Thy ethic page.] He refers to Aristotle's Ethics: "Me™* $i rotZr* ktxriov,

ocXXyiv iroirio'K.f/.tvovs afx^r on t£v srt^i rot ¥i8r) fivxraiv rgtut, tarlv i'ISy), xocxlot., ot,x^a.tria.,

e*i^6Tns." Ethic. Nicomach. lib. 7. cap. i. "In the next place, entering on
another division of the subject, let it be defined, that respecting morals there
are three sorts of things to be avoided, malice, incontinence, and brutishness."

2 Her laws.'] Aristotle's Physics. — " *H tix»*i fJUfAtlreu t%v $6<rw." Arist.
*T2. AKP. lib. 2. cap. ii. "Art imitates nature." — See the Coltivazione of
Alamauni, lib. 1 :

l'arte umana

Altro non e da dir ch' un dolce sprone,
Un correger soave, un pio sostegno,
Uno esperto imitar, comporre accorto
Un sollecito attar con studio e'ngegno
La cagion natural, 1' effetto, e 1' opra.

3 Second in descent.] Si che vostr' arte a Dio quasi e nipote.
So Frezzi :

Giustizia fu da cielo, e di Dio e figlia,

E ogni bona legge a Dio e nipote. II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. ii.

4 Creation's holy book.] Genesis, ii. 15: "And the Lord God took the
man, and put him into the garden of Eden, to dress it, and to keep it." And,
Genesis, iii. 19 ; "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread."

113—121. HELL, Canto XII. 55

To human kind. But in another path
The usurer walks ; and Nature in herself
And in her follower thus he sets at nought,
Placing elsewhere his hope.1 But follow now
My steps on forward journey bent ; for now
The Pisces play with undulating glance
Along the horizon, and the Wain 2 lies all
O'er the north-west ; and onward there a space
Is our steep passage down the rocky height."

CANTO XII.

QxQmntnt

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 downwards from crag to crag ;
till, drawing near the bottom, they descry a river of blood, wherein are
tormented such as have committed violence against their neighbour. 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.

The 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 3
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 4 it might give

1 Placing elsewhere his hope.] The usurer, trusting in the produce of his
wealth lent out on usury, despises nature directly, because he does not avail
himself of her means for maintaining or enriching himself ; and indirectly,
because he does not avail himself of the means which art, the follower and
imitator of nature, would afford him for the same purposes.

2 The Wain.] The constellation Bootes, or Charles's Wain.

3 Adice's stream.] After a great deal having been said on the subject, it
still appears very uncertain at what part of the river this fall of the mountain
happened.

4 Some passage.] Lombardi erroneously, I think, understands by "alcuna
via" "no passage ;" in which sense "alcuno" is certainly sometimes used by
some old writers. Monti, as usual, agrees with Lombardi. See Note to
c. iii. v. 40.

oG THE VISION. 10—33.

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,1 detested "brood

Of the feigned heifer : 2 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 3 here, who, in the world

Above, thy death contrived. Monster ! avaunt !

He comes not tutor'd by thy sister's art,4

But to behold your torments is he come."

Like to a bull,5 that with impetuous spring
Darts, at the moment when the fatal blow
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 6 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

1 The infamy of Crete.] The* Minotaur.

2 Thefeign'd heifer.] Pasiphai-'.

3 The king of Athens.] Theseus, who was enabled by the instruction of
Ariadne, the sister of the Minotaur, to destroy that monster. " Duca d'Atene. "
So Chaucer calls Theseus :

Whilom, as olde stories tellen us,

There was a duk, that highte Theseus. The Knighte's Tale.
And Shakspeare : Happy be Theseus, our renowned Duke.

Midsummer Night's Dream, act i. sc. 1.

"This is in reality," observes Mr. Douce, "no misapplication of a modern
title, as Mr. Stevens conceived, but a legitimate use of the word in its primitive
Latin sense of leader, and so it is often \ised in the Bible. Shakspeare might
have found Duke Theseus in the Book of Troy, or in Turberville's Ovid's
Epistles. See the argument to that of Phaedra and Hippolytus." Donee's
Illustrations of Shakspeare, 8vo, 18C7, vol. i. p. 1~0.

4 Thy sister's art.] Ariadne.

5 Like to a bull.]

'fit S oraty e£im f-Xu* sreXtastiy ett&Jo; <xv£j,
Ka-4/atf i^0Ti8i» zi°a.uv (Zoof iy^xCXeio,

Homer, II. lib. 17. 682.
As when some vig'rous youth with sharpen'd axe
A pastur'd bullock smites behind the horns,
And hews the muscle through ; he at the stroke
Springs forth and falls. Cowper's Translation.

6 To weight.] Incumbent on the dusky air

That felt unusual weight. Milton, P. L. b. 1. 227.

34— GJ). HELL, Canto XII. 57

Hither descended to the nether hell,
This rock was not yet fallen. But past doubt.
(If well I mark) not long ere He arrived,1
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,
W hereby, there are who deem, the world hath oft
Been into chaos turn'd : 2 and in that point,
Here, and elsewhere, that old rock toppled down.
But fix thine eyes beneath : the river of blood 3
Approaches, in the which all those are steep'd,
Who have by violence injured." 0 blind lust !
0 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
Condemned, who down this steep have journey 'd. Speak
From whence ye stand, or else the bow I draw."

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 4 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

1 He arrived.'] Our Saviour, who, according to Dante, when he ascended
from hell, carried with him the souls of the Patriarchs, and of other just
men, out of the first circle. See Canto iv.

2 Been into chaos turn'd.] This opinion is attributed to Empedocles.

3 The river of blood.] Deinde vidi locum (Qu. lacum?) magnum totum, ut
mihi videbatur, plenum sanguine. Sed dixit mihi Apostolus, sed non sanguis,
sed ignis est ad concremandos homicidas, et odiosos deputatus. Hanc tamen
similitudinem propter sanguinis effusionem retinet. Alberici Visio, sec. 7.

* And wrought himself revenge.] Nessus, when dying by the hand of
Hercules, 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. Deianira had occasion to try the experiment ;
ami the venom acting, as Nessus had intended, caused Hercules to expire in
torments. See the, Trachinice of Sophocles.

58 THE VISION. 70—105.

The foss these go by thousands, aiming shafts

At whatsoever spirit dares emerge 1

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 2 spake : " Return, and be their guide.
And if ye chance to cross another troop,
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. Here they wail aloud

1 Emerge.] Multos in eis vidi usque ad talos demergi, alios usque ad genua,
vel femora, alios usque ad pectiis juxta peccati vidi modum : alios vero qui
majoris criminis noxa tenebantur in ipsis summitatibus supersedere conspexi.
Alberici Visio, sec. 3.

2 Nessus.] Our Poet was probably induced, by the following line in Ovid,
to assign to Nessus the task of conducting them over the ford :

Nessus adit membrisque valens scitusque vadorum. Metam. lib. 9.
And Ovid's authority was Sophocles, who says of this Centaur :

Of tov fieiBCppovv frOTotu'ov Eiir,vov (Sporovs
"MurOov tripivt %iptr)v ovti tro/*fri/u.oi{
Kuirxti £§sW.*y, ovt ^oti^iiriv vtuf. TfOLcTl. 570.

He in his arms, across Evenus' stream
Deep-flowing, bore the passenger for hire,
Without or sail or billow-cleaving oar.

106-128. HELL, Canto XII. 59

Their merciless wrongs. Here Alexander dwells,

And Dionysius fell, who many a year

Of woe wrought for fair Sicily. That brow,

"Whereon the hair so jetty clusterings lianas,

Is Azzolino ; 1 that with flaxen locks

Obizzo 2 of Este, in the world destroy'd

By his foul step-son." To the bard revered

I turn'd me round, and thus he spake : " 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 3 in God's bosom smote the heart,

Which yet is honour'd 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 reinember'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.

" As ever on this side the boiling wave
Thou seest diminishing," the Centaur said,

1 Azzolino.] Azzolino, or Ezzolino cli Romano, a most cruel tyrant in the
Marca Trivigiana, Lord of Padua, Vicenza, 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. See also the Paradise, Canto ix. ;
Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 2. c. xxv. st. 50 ; Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. iii. st. 33 ; and
Tassoni, Secchia Rapita, c. viii. st. 11.

2 Obizzo of Este.~\ Marquis of Ferrara 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 treasxires which his rapacity had amassed. See
Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. iii. st. 32. He died in 1293, according to Gibbon, Ant. of
the House of Brunswick, Posth. Works, vol. ii. 4to.

3 He.] " Henrie, the brother of this Edmund, and son to the foresaid king
of Almaine (Richard, brother of Henry III. 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 Leicester, 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. Yillani, Hist. lib. 7. cap. 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." Lombardi suggests that " ancor si cola " in the
text may mean, not that "the heart was still honoured," but that it was put
into a perforated cup in order that the blood dripping from it might excite the
spectators to revenge. This is surely too improbable.

Un poco prima dove piu si stava
Sicuro Enrico, il conte di Monforte
L'alma del corpo col coltel gli cava.

Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xxix.

GO THE VISION. 129—140.

" So on the other, be thou well assured,

It lower still and lower sinks its bed,

Till in that part it re-uniting 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,1 and extracts

Tears ever by the seething flood unlock'd

From the Rinieri, of Corneto this,

Pazzo the other named,2 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 compartment, which con-
tains both those who have done violence on their own persons and those
who have violently consumed their goods ; the first changed 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 more-
over in what manner the souls are transformed into those trunks. Of the
latter crew, he recognises 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.

Ere Nessus yet had reach'd the other bank,

We enter'd on a forest,3 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

1 On Sextus and on Pyrrhus.'] Sextus, either the son of Tarquin the Proud,
or of Pompey the Great ; and Pyrrhus, king of Epirus.

2 The Rinieri, of Corneto this,

Pazzo the other named. ]

Two noted marauders, by whose depredations the public ways in Italy were
infested. The latter was of the noble family of Pazzi in Florence.

3 A forest.] Inde in aliam vallem nimis terribiliorem deveni plenam
subtilissimis arboribus in modum hastarum sexaginta brachiorum longitudi-
nem habentibus, quarum omnium capita, ac si sudes acutissima erant, et
spinosa. Alberici Yisio, sec. 4,

9—44. HELL, Canto XIII. Gl

Those animals, that hate the cultured fields,
Betwixt Corneto and Cecina's stream.1

Here the brute Harpies make their nest, the same
"Who from the Strophades 2 the Trojan band
Drove with dire boding of their future woe.
Broad are their pennons,3 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 farther 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 resumed : " 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 4 a branch,
And straight the trunk exclaim'd : "Why pluck'st thou me 1 K
Then, as the dark blood trickled down its side,
These words it added : "Wherefore tear'st me thus?
Is there no touch of mercy in thy breast ?
Men once were we, that now are rooted here.
Thy hand might well have 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.

1 Betii'ixt Corneto and Cecina's stream.'] A wild and woody tract of country,
abounding in deer, goats, and wild boars. Cecina is a river not far to the south
of Leghorn ; Corneto, a small city on the same coast, in the patrimony of the
Church.

2 The Strophades.] See Virg. JEn. lib. 3. 210.
' Broad arc their pennons.]

Virginei volucrum vultus, foedissima ventris
Proluvies, uncreque maims et pallida semper

Ora fame. Virg. JEn. lib. 3. 216.

1 Gather'd I.] So Frezzi :

A quelle frasche stesi su la mano,

E d'una vetta un ramuscel ne colsi ;

Allora ella grido : oime, fa piano,
E sangue vivo usci, ond' io lo tolsi. II Quadrir. lib. 1. cap. iv.

62 THE VISION. 45-67.

I, letting fall tlie bough, reinain'd as one
Assail'd by terror ; and the sage replied :
" If he, 0 injured spirit ! could have believed
What he hath seen but in my verse described,1
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."
" Tli at pleasant word of thine," 2 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,3 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,4 who ne'er turn'd her gloating eyes

1 In my verse described.] The commentators explain this, " If lie could
have believed, in cousequence of my assurances alone, that of which he hath
now had ocular proof, he would not have stretched forth his hand against
thee." But I am of opinion that Dante makes Virgil allude to his own story
of Polydorus, in the third hook of the JEneid.

2 That pleasant word of thine.] "Since you have inveigled me to speak by
holding forth so gratifying an expectation, let it not displease you if I am as
it were detained in the snare you have spread for me, so as to be somewhat
prolix in my answer."

3 / it v:as.] Piero delle Vigne, a native of Capua, who from a low condition
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
Frederick believe that he held a secret and traitorous intercourse with the
Pope, who was then at enmity with the Emperor. 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 by dashing out his brains against the walls
of a church, in the year 1245. Both Frederick and Piero delle Vigne composed
verses in the Sicilian dialect, which are now extant. A canzone by each of
them may be seen in the ninth book of the Sonetti and Canzoni di diversi
Autori Toscani, published by the Giunti in 1527. See further the Note on
Purg. Canto iii. 110.

4 The harlot.] Envy. Chaucer alludes to this, in the Prologue to the
Legende of Good Women :

Envie is lavender to the court alway,
For she ne parte th neither night ne day
Out of the house of Cesar : thus saith bant.

68—116. HELL, Canto XIII. 63

From Caesar'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 honours 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 honour ; and of you,
If auy to the world indeed return,
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,
Each 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

64 THE VISIOX. 117—144.

Loud rustling round him hears. And lo ! there came

Two naked, torn with briers, in headlong flight,

That they before them broke each fan o' th' wood.1

" Haste now," the foremost cried, " now haste thee, death ! "

The other, as seem'd, impatient of delay,

Exclaiming, " Lano ! 2 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 : " 0 Giacomo

Of Sant' Andrea ! 3 what avails it thee,"

It cried, " that of nle 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 : " 0 ye spirits ! arrived in time
To spy the shameful havoc that from me
My leaves hath severed thus, gather them up,
And at the foot of their sad parent-tree
Carefully lay them. In that city4 I dwelt,

1 Each fan o' tK wood.] Hence perhaps Milton :

Leaves and fuming rills, Aurora's fan. P. L. b. 5. 6.

Some have translated "rosta " " impediment," instead of '; fan."

> Lano.] Lano, a Siennese, who, being 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 Floren-
tines against the Aretini, took that opportunity of exposing himself to cer-
tain death, in the engagement which took place at Toppo near Arezzo. See
G. Villani, Hist. lib. 7. cap. cxix.

3 0 Giacomo

Of Sant' A ndrea f] Jacopo da Sant' Andrea, a Paduan/who, having wasted
his property in the most wanton acts of profusion, killed himself in despair.

4 In that city.'] " I was an inhabitant 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 remains of his
statue were not still visible on the bridge over the Arno, she would have been
already levelled to the ground ; and thus the citizens, who raised her again
from the ashes to which Attila had reduced her, would have laboured in vain."
See Paradise, Canto xvi. 44. The relic of antiquity, to which the superstition
of Florence attached so high an importance, was carried away by a flood, that
destroyed the bridge on which it stood, in the year 1337, but without the ill
effects that were apprehended from the loss of their fancied Palladium.

145—152. HELL, Canto XIV. 65

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
Upon the ashes left by Attila,
Had labour'd without profit of their toil.
I slung the fatal noose1 from my own roof."

CANTO XIY.

^Uamnent.

They arrive at the beginning of the third of those compartments 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, turning to the left along the forest of self-slayers, and having jour-
neyed a little onwards, they meet with a streamlet of blood that issues
from the forest and traverses the sandy plain. Here Virgil speaks to our
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.

Soon 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 steril bed

Each plant repell'd. The mournful wood waves round

Its garland on all sides, as round the wood

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 2 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

1 / slung the fatal noose.] We are not informed who this suicide was ; some
calling him Rocco de' Mozzi, and others Lotto degli Agli.

2 By Cato's foot.] See Lucan, Phars. lib. 9.

E

66 THE VISION. 20—53.

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,1 as flakes of snow
On Alpine summit, when the wind is hush'd.
As, in the torrid Indian clime,2 the son
Of Amnion 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 vapour was extinguish'd, while alone :
So fell the eternal fiery flood, wherewith
The marie glow'd underneath, as under stove3
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 I am. 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 labouring by turns,
In Mongibello,4 while he cries aloud,

1 Dilated flakes of fire.] Compare Tasso, G. L. c. x. st. 61 :

Al fin giungemmo al loco, ove gia scese
Fiamma del cielo in dilatate falde,
E di natura vendico l'offese
Sovra la gente in mal oprar si salde.

2 As, in the torrid Indian clime.] Landino refers to Albertus Magnus for
the circumstance here alluded to.

3 As under stove.'] So Frezzi :

Si come 1' esca al foco del focile. Lib. 1. cap. xvii.

4 In Mongibello.] More hot than iEtn' or flaming Mongibell.

Spenser, F. Q. b. 2. c. ix. st. 29.
Siccome alia fucina in Mongibello Batte folgori e foco col martello,

Fabrica tuono il demonio Vulcano, E con esso i suoi fabri in ogni mano.

Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 1. c. xvi. st. 21.

See Virg. JEn. lib. 8. 416. It would be endless to refer to parallel passages
in the Greek writers.

54—91. HELL, Canto XIV. 67

Help, help, good Mulciber ! ' as erst he cried
In the Phlegraean warfare ; and the bolts
Launch he, full aini'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 !
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,1
Who girt the Theban walls with siege, and held,
As still he seems to hold, God in disdain,
And sets his high omnipotence at nought.
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,2 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, nought 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,3 in old times, the world

1 This of the seven kings was one.] Compare JSsch. Seven Chiefs, 425 ;
Euripides, Phcen. 1179 ; and Statius, Theb. lib. 10. 821.

2 Bulicame.] A warm medicinal spring near Viterbo ; tbe waters of which,
as Landino and Vellutello affirm, passed by a place of ill-fame. Venturi, with
less probability, conjectures that Dante would imply that it was the scene of
much licentious merriment among those who frequented its baths.

3 Under ivhose monarch.]

Credo pudicitiam Saturno rege moratam

In terris. Juv. Satir. vi.

In Saturn's reign, at Nature's early birth,

There was a thing call'd chastity on earth. Dryden.

68 THE VISION. 92—133.

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 ;

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 towards Damiata ; and at Rome,

As in his mirror, looks. Of finest gold

His head1 is shaped, pure silver are the breast

And arms, thence to the middle is of brass,

And downward all beneath well- tempered 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,

From 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 2 might have resolved
One thou proposest. Lethe thou shalt see,
But not within this hollow, in the place
Whither,3 to lave themselves, the spirits go,

1 His head.] This is imitated "by Frezzi, in the Quadriregio, lib. 4. cap. xiv. :

La statua grande vidi in an gran piano, etc.
" This image's head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his
belly and his thighs of brass : his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of
clay." Daniel, ii. 32, 33.

2 The red seething wave.] This he might have known was Phlegethon.

3 Whither.] On the other side of Purgatory.

134—138. HELL, Caxto XV. 69

Whose blame hath been by penitence removed."
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 vapour is extinct."

CAXTO 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 who have done violence to Nature ; and amongst
them Dante distinguishes Brunetto Latini, who had been formerly his
master ; with whom, turning a little backward, he holds a discourse which
occupies the remainder of this Canto.

One 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 1 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.2

Thus narrowly explored by all the tribe,

1 Chiarentana.'] A part of the Alps where the Brenta rises ; which river
is much swoln as soon as the snow begins to dissolve on the mountains.

2 As an old tailor at his needle's eye.] In Fazio degli Uberti's Ditta-
mondo, lib. 4. cap. iv. the tailor is introduced in a simile scarcely less
picturesque :

Perche tanto mi stringe a questo punto
La lunga tenia, ch' io fo come il sarto
Che quando affretta spesso passa il punto.

70 THE VISION. 22—28.

I was agnized of one, who by the skirt

Caught me, and cried, " What wonder have we here 1 "

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 towards his face
My hand inclining, answer'd : " Ser Brunetto ! x

1 Brunetto.'] "Ser Brunetto, a Florentine, the secretary or chancellor of
the city, and Dante's preceptor, hath left us a work so little read, that botli
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
practice, or, as he expresses it, un enchaussement des choses divines et hu-
maines," etc. Sir R. Clayton's Translation of Tenhove's Memoirs of the
Medici, vol. i. ch. ii. p. 104. The Tresor has never been printed in the
original language. There is a fine manuscript of it in the British Museum,
with an illuminated portrait of Brunetto in his study, prefixed. Mus. Brit.
MSS. 17. E. 1. Tesor. It is divided into four books : the first, on Cosmogony
and Theology ; the second, a translation of Aristotle's Ethics ; the third, on
Virtues and Vices ; the fourth, on Rhetoric. For an interesting memoir
relating to this work, see Hist, de I' Acad, des Inscriptions, torn. vii. 296.
His Tesoretto, one of the earliest productions of Italian poetry, is a curious
work, not unlike the writings of Chaucer in style and numbers ; though
Bembo remarks, that his pupil, however largely he had stolen from it, could
not have much enriched himself. As it is perhaps but little known, I will
here add a slight sketch of it. Brunetto describes himself as returning from
an embassy to the King of Spain, on which he had been sent by the Guelph
party from Florence. On the plain of Roncesvalles he meets a scholar on a
bay mule —

un scolaio There a scholar I espied

Sur un muletto baio. On a bay mule that did ride.

— who tells him that the Guelfi are driven out of the city with great loss.
Struck with grief at these mournful tidings, and musing with his head bent
downwards, he loses his road, and wanders into a wood. Here Nature, whose
figure is described with sublimity, appears, and discloses to him the secrets of
her operations. After this, he wanders into a desert —

Deh che paese fiero Well-away ! what fearful ground

Trovai in quella parte. In that savage part I found.

Che s'io sapessi d'arte If of art I aught could ken,

Quivi mi bisognava. Well behoved me use it then.

Che quanto piu mirava More I look'd, the more I deem'd

Piu mi parea selvaggio. That it wild and desert seem'd.

Quivi non a viaggio, Not a road was there in sight,

Quivi non a persone, Not a house, and not a wight ;

Quivi non a magione. Not a bird, and not a brute,

Non bestia non uccello, Not a rill, and not a root ;

Non flume non ruscello, Not an emmet, not a fly,

Non formica non mosca, Not a thing I mote descry.

Non cosa ch'io conosca. Sore I doubted therewithal

Ed io pensando forte Whether death would me befal :

Dottai ben della morte, Nor was wonder, for around

E non e maraviglia, Full three hundred miles of ground

Che ben trecento miglia, Right across on every side

Durava d'ogni lato, Lay the desert bare and wide.

Quel paese smagato.

29—45. HELL, Canto XV. 71

And are ye here 1 " He thus to me : " 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."

" 0 son ! " said he, " whoever of this throng
One instant stops, lies then a hundred years,
No fan to ventilate him, when the fire
Smites sorest. Pass thou therefore on. I close
Will at thy garments walk, and then rejoin
My troop, who go mourning their endless doom."

I dared not from the path descend to tread
On equal ground with him, but held my head
Bent down, as one who walks in reverent guise.

— and proceeds on his way, under the protection of a banner with which
Nature had furnished him, till on the third day he finds himself in a pleasant
champain, where are assembled many emperors, kings, and sages :

Un gran piano giocondo Wide and far the champain lay,

Lo piu gajo del mondo None in all the earth so gay.

E lo piu degnitoso.
It is thv, habitation of Virtue and her daughters, the four Cardinal Virtues.
Here Brunetto sees also Courtesy, Bounty, Loyalty, and Prowess, and hears
the instructions they give to a knight, which occupy about a fourth part of
the poem. Leaving this territory, he passes over valleys, mountains, woods,
forests, and bridges, till he arrives in a beautiful valley covered with flowers
on all sides, and the richest in the world ; but which was continually shift-
ing its appearance from a round figure to a square, from obscurity to light,
and from populousness to solitude. This is the region of Pleasure, or Cupid,
who is accompanied by four ladies, Love, Hope, Fear, and Desire. In one
part of it he meets with Ovid, and is instructed by him how to conquer
the passion of love, and to escape from that place. After his escape, he
makes his confession to a friar, and then returns to the forest of visions ;
and, ascending a mountain, meets with Ptolemy, a venerable old man.
Here the narrative breaks off. The poem ends, as it began, with an address
to Rustico di Filippo, on whom he lavishes every sort of praise.

It has been observed that Dante derived the idea of opening his poem by
describing himself as lost in a wood, from the Tesoretto of his master. I know
not whether it has been remarked, that the crime of usury is branded by
both these poets as offensive to God and Nature : —

Un altro, che non cura One, that holdeth not in mind

Di Dio ne di Natura, Law of God or Nature's kind,

Si diventa usuriere. Taketh him to usury.

— or that the sin for which Brunetto is condemned by his pupil is mentioned
in his Tesoretto with great horror. But see what is said on this subject by
Perticari, Degli Scrittori del Trecento, lib. 1. cap. iv. Dante's twenty-fifth sonnet
is a jocose one, addressed to Brunetto, of which a translation is inserted
in the Life of Dante prefixed. He died in 1295. G. Villani sums up his
account of him by saying, that he was himself a worldly man ; but that he
was the first to refine the Florentines from their grossness, and to instruct
them in speaking properly, and in conducting the affairs of the republic on
principles of policy.

72 THE VISION. 46-83.

"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 x 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."

" If 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
Had gladly given thee comfort in thy work.
But that ungrateful and malignant race,
Who in old times came down from Fesole,2
Ay and still smack of their rough mountain-Hint,
Will for thy good deeds show thee enmity.
Nor wonder ; for amongst ill-savour'd crabs
It suits not the sweet fig-tree lay her fruit.
Old fame reports them in the world for blind,3
Covetous, envious, proud. Look to it well :
Take heed thou cleanse thee of their ways. For thee,
Thy fortune hath such honour 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 reniain'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

1 Before mine age."] On the whole, Vellutello's explanation of this is, I
think, most satisfactory. He supposes it to mean, ""before the appointed en<l
of his life was arrived — before his days were accomplished." Lombardi, con-
cluding that the fulness of age must be the same as "the midway of this our
mortal life " (see Canto i. v. 1), understands that he bad lost himself in the
wood before that time, and that he then only discovered his having gone
astray.

2 Who in old times came down from Fesole.] See G. Villani, Hist. lib. 4.
cap. v. and Macchiav. Hist, of Flor. h. 2.

■ Blind.] It is said that the Florentines were thus called, in consequence
of their having been deceived by a shallow artifice practised on them by the
Pisans, in the year 1117. See G. Villani, lib. 4. cap. xxx.

84—114. HELL, Canto XV. 73

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 1 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
Turn'd himself back, then look'd at me, and spake :
" 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 ; 2 and Accorso's son,
Francesco,3 herds among that wretched throng :
And, if the wish of so impure a blotch
Possess'd thee, him 4 thou also mightst have seen,
Who by the servants' servant 5 was transferr'd

1 With another text.] He refers to the prediction of Farinata, in Canto x.

2 Priscian.'] There is no reason to believe, as the commentators observe,
that the grammarian of this name was stained with the vice imputed to him ;
and we must therefore suppose that Dante puts the individual for the species,
and implies the frequency of the crime among those who abused the oppor-
tunities which the education of youth afforded them, to so abominable a
purpose.

3 Francesco.] Accorso, a Florentine, interpreted the Roman law at Bologna,
and died in 1229, at the age of 78. His authority was so great as to exceed
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 epitaph: "Sepulcrum Accursii Glossatoris et
Francisci ejus Filii." See Guidi Panziroli, De Claris Legum Interpretibus, lil>.
2. cap. xxix. Lips. 4to, 1721.

4 Him.] Andrea de' Mozzi, who, that his scandalous life might be less
exposed to observation, was translated either by Nicolas III. or Boniface VIII.
from the see of Florence to that of Vicenza, through which passes the river
Bacchiglione. At the latter of these places he died.

5 The servants' servant.] Servo de' servi. So Ariosto, Sat. iii.

Degli servi
Io sia il gran servo,

74 THE VISION. 115—126.

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-risen on the sandy plain.
A company, with whom I may not sort,
Approaches. I commend my Treasure to thee,1
Wherein I yet survive ; my sole request."

This said, he turn'd, and seem'd as one of those
Who o'er Verona's champain try their speed
For the green mantle ; and of them he seem'd,
Not he who loses but who gains the prize.

CANTO XVI.

girgumrwi

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 countryman 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.

Now 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 towards 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 turn'd to me his visage, and then spake :
" Wait now : our courtesy these merit well :

1 / cominend my Treasure to thee.] Brunetto's great work, the Tresor :
Sieti raccomandato '1 mio Tesoro.
So Giusto de' Conti, in his Bella Mano, Son. " Occhi :
Siavi raccomandato il mio Tesoro.

16—38. HELL, Canto XVI. 75

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.

" If woe of this unsound and dreary waste,"
Thus one began, " added to our sad cheer
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 belie vest ; grandchild of the chaste
Gualdrada,1 him they Guidoguerra call'd,

1 Gualdrada.~\ Gualdrada was the daughter of Belliucione Berti, of whom
mention is made in the Paradise, Canto xv. and xvi. He was of the family of
Ravignani, a branch of the Adimari. The Emperor Otho IV., being at a
festival in Florence, where Gualdrada was present, was struck with her
beauty ; and inquiring who she was, was answered by Bellincione, that she
was the daughter of one who, if it was his Majesty's pleasure, would make her
admit the honour of his salute. On overhearing 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
freedom except him who should be her lawful 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, Gug-
lielmo and Ruggieri ; the latter of whom was father of Guidoguerra, a man of
great military skill and prowess ; who, at the head of four hundred Florentines
of the Guelph party, was signally instrumental to the victory obtained at
Benevento by Charles of Anjou, over Manfredi, King of Naples, in 1265. One
of the consequences of this victory was the expulsion of the Ghibellini, and the
re-establishment of the Guelfi at Florence. Borghini {Disc. delV Orig. di
Firenze, ediz. 1755, pag. 6), as cited by Lombardi, endeavours by a comparison
of dates to throw discredit on the above relation of Gualdrada's answer to her
father, which is found in G. Villani, lib. 5. cap. xxxvii. : and Lombardi adds,
that if it had been true, Bellincione would have been worthy of a place in the
eighteeenth Canto of Hell, rather than of being mentioned with praise in the
Paradise : to which it may be answered, that the proposal of the father, how-
ever irreconcileable it may be to our notions of modern refinement, might
possibly in those times have been considered rather as a sportive sally than as
a serious exposure of his daughter's innocence. The incident is related, in a

76 THE VISION 39—72.

Who in liia lifetime many a noble act x
Achieved, both by his wisdom and his sword.
The other, next to me that beats the sand,
Is Aldobrandi,2 name deserving well,
In the upper world, of honour ; and myself,
Who in this torment do partake with them,
Am Rusticucci,3 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
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 valour, as they wont,
Dwell in our city, or have vanish'd clean :
For one amidst us late condemn'd to wail,
Borsiere,4 yonder walking with his peers,
Grieves us no little by the news he brings."

" An upstart multitude and sudden gains,

manner very unfavourable to Berti, by Francesco Sansovino, in one of his
Novelle, inserted by Mr. Thomas Roscoe in his entertaining selection from the
Italian Novelists, vol. iii. p. 137.

1 Many a noble act.]

Molto egli opro col senno e con la mano. Tasso, G. L. c. i. st. 1.

2 Aldobrandi.] Tegghiaio Aldobrandi was of the noble family of Adimari,
and much esteemed for his military talents. He endeavoured 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
sustained at Montaperto, and the consequent banishment of the Guelfi from
Florence.

3 Rusticucci.] Giacopo Rusticucci, a Florentine, remarkable for his opulence
and the generosity of his spirit.

4 Borsiere.] Guglielmo Borsiere, another Florentine, whom Boccaccio, in a
story which he relates of him, terms " a man of courteous and elegant manners,
and of great readiness in conversation." Dec. Giorn. i. Nov. 8.

73—103. HELL, Canto XVI. 77

Pride and excess, 0 Florence ! have in thee
Engender'd, so that now in tears thou niourn'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, 0 happy thou !
Gifted with words so apt to speak thy thought.
Wherefore, if thou escape this darksome clime,
Keturning to behold the radiant stars,
When thou with pleasure shalt retrace the past,2
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
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,3 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,4 by that name no longer known,
Rebellows o'er Saint Benedict, roll'd on
From the Alpine summit down a precipice,
Where space 5 enough to lodge a thousand spreads ;
Thus downward from a craggy steep we found

1 At so little cost.'] They intimate to our poet (as Lombardi well observes)
the inconveniences to which his freedom of speech was about to expose him in
the future course of his life.

2 When thou with pleasure shalt retrace the past.]

Quando ti giovera dicere io fui.
So Tasso, G. L. c. xv. st. 38 :

Quando mi giovera narrar altrui
Le novita vedute, e dire ; io fui.

3 E'en as the river.] He compares the fall of Phlegethon to that of the
Montone (a river in Romagna) from the Apennine above the Abbey of St.
Benedict. All the other streams, that rise between the sources of the Po and
the Montone, and fall from the left side of the Apennine, join the Po, and
accompany it to the sea.

4 At Forli.] Because there it loses the name of Acquacheta, and takes that
of Montone.

5 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-
tory, as Boccaccio related on the authority of the abbot, had intended to build
a castle near the waterfall, and to collect within its walls the population of
the neighbouring villages.

78 THE VISION. 104—125.

That this dark wave resounded, roaring loud,
So that the ear its clamour soon had stunn'd.

I had a cord 1 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.2

" Quickly shall come," he said, " what I expect ;
Thine eye discover quickly that, whereof
Thy thought is dreaming." Ever to that truth,8
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,

1 A cord.] This passage, as it is confessed by Landino, involves a fiction
sufficiently obscure. His own attempt to unravel it does not much lessen the
difficulty. That which Lombardi has made is something better. It is believed
that our Poet, in the earlier part of his life, had entered into the order of St.
Francis. By observing the rules of that profession, he had designed to mortify
his carnal 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." This part of the habit he is now desired by Virgil
to take off ; and it is thrown down the gulf, to allure Geryon to them with the
expectation of carrying down one who had cloaked his iniquities under the
garb of penitence and self-mortification ; and thus (to apply to Dante on this
occasion the words of Milton) —

He, as Franciscan, thought to pass disguised.

2 But spy into the thoughts with subtle skill.]

Sorrise Uranio, che per entro vede
Gli altrui pensier col senno. Menzini, Sonetto, Mentre io dormia.

3 Ever to that truth.] This memorable apophthegm is repeated by Luigi
Pulci and Trissino :

Sempre a quel ver, ch' ha faccia di menzogna,

E piu senno tacer la lingua cheta,

Che spesso senza colpa fa vergogna. Morgante Magg. c. xxiv.

La verita che par mensogna,
Si dovrebbe tacer dalT uom ch' e saggio. Italia Lib. c. xvi.

4 By these notes.] So Frezzi :

Per queste rime mie, lettor, ti giuro. II Quadrir. lib. 3. cap. xvi.
In like manner, Pindar confirms his veracity by an oath :

N«) pot, yct^ "Ogxev, sfA&v hofav. Nein. xi. 30.

which is imitated, as usual, by Chiabrera :
Ed io lungo il Permesso
Sacro alle Muse oblighero mia fede. Canz. Erioche, xliii. 75.

126—134. HELL, Canto XVII. 79

Which now I sing, reader, I swear to thee,

So may they favour 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.

QxQummt

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 per-
mission, goes a little farther 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.

" Lo ! the fell monster x 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
Eeach'd to the arm-pits ; and the back and breast,
And either side, were painted o'er with nodes
And orbits. Colours variegated more
Nor Turks nor Tartars e'er on cloth of state
With interchangeable embroidery wove,
Nor spread Arachne o'er her curious loom.
As oft-times 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,

1 The fell monster.] Fraud.

80 THE VISION. 26— 65.

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 marie, ten paces on the verge
Proceeded. Soon as we to him arrive,
A little farther 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 vapours 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 x
With colours 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 2 I saw with azure wrought,
That wore a lion's countenance and port.
Then, still my sight pursuing its career,
Another 3 I beheld, than blood more red,
A goose display of whiter wing than curd.
And one, who bore a fat and azure swine 4
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 neighbour here

1 A pouch.] A purse, whereon the armorial bearings of each were em-
blazoned. According to Landino, our Poet implies that the usurer can pretend
to no other honour than such as he derives from his purse and his family.
The description of persons by their heraldic insignia is remarkable both on the
present and several other occasions in this poem.

2 A yellow purse.] The arms of the Gianfigliazzi of Florence.

3 Another.] Those of the Ubbriachi, another Florentine family of high
distinction

4 A fat and azure sioine.] The arms of the Scrovigni, a noble family of
Padua.

W_y8. HELL, Canto XVII. 81

Vitaliano 1 on my left shall sit.

A Paduan with these Florentines am I.

Oft-times they thunder in mine ears, exclaiming,

1 Oh ! haste that noble knight,- he who the pouch

' With the three goats 3 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,4 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 5 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."

But he whose succour 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

1 Vitaliano.] Vitaliano del Dente, a Paduan.

2 That noble knight.] Giovanni Bujamonti, a Florentine usurer, the most
infamous of his time.

3 Goats.] Monti, in his Proposta, had introduced a facetious dialogue on
the supposed mistake made in the interpretation of this word " Becchi "by the
compilers of the Delia Crusca Dictionary, who translated it "goats," instead
of "beaks." He afterwards saw his own error, and had the ingenuousness to
confess it in the Appendix, p. 274. Having in the former editions of this
work been betrayed into the same misunderstanding of my author, I cannot do
less than follow so good an example, by acknowledging and correcting it.

4 As one.] Dante trembled with fear, like a man who, expecting the return
of a quartan ague, shakes even at the sight of a place made cool by the shade.

5 But shame.] I have followed the reading in Vellutello's edition,

Ma vergogna mi fe le sue minacce ;
which appears preferable to the common one,

Ma vergogna mi fer, etc.
It is necessary that I should observe this, because it has been imputed to me
as a mistake.

82 THE VISION. 99— 132.

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, " 111 way thou keep'st,"
Than was my dread, when round me on each part
The air I viewed, 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
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 of the eighth circle, divided into
ten gulfs, which contain as many different descriptions of fraudulent sin-
ners ; 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 duty ; and these are scourged of demons in
the first gulf : the other sort is of flatterers, who in the second gulf are
condemned to remain immersed in filth.

There is a place within the depths of hell
Call'd Malebolge, all of rock dark-stain'd

3—29. HELL, Canto XVIII. &3

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 1
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 dikes 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
Were naked sinners. Hitherward they came,
Meeting our faces, from the middle point ;
With us beyond,2 but with a larger stride.
E'en thus the Romans,3 when the year returns

1 Sure defence.] La parte dov' e' son rendon sicura.

This is the common readiug ; besides which there are two others :

La parte dove il sol rende fignra ;
and, La parte dov' ei son rende fignra :

the former of which two, Lombardi says, is found in Laniello's edition, printed
at Venice, 1568 ; in that printed in the same city with the commentaries of
Landino and Vellntello, 1572 ; and also in some MSS. The latter, which has
very much the appearance of being genuine, was adopted by Lombardi him-
self, on the authority of a text supposed to be in the handwriting of Filippo
Yillani, but so defaced by the alterations made in it by some less skilful hand,
that the traces of the old ink were with difficulty recovered ; and it has, since
the publication of Lombardi's edition, been met with also in the Monte Casino
MS. Monti is decided in favour of Lombardi's reading, and Biagioli opposed
to it.

2 With us beyond.] Beyond the middle point they tended the same way
with us, but their pace was quicker than ours.

3 E'en thus the Romans.] In the year 1300, Pope Boniface VIII., to remedy
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. 8. cap. xxxvi. It was
at this time, and on this occasion, as the honest historian tells us, that he first
conceived the design of " compiling his book."

84 THE VISION. 30— (35.

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 towards 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 nought ; for I exclaim'd :
" Thou who dost cast thine eye upon the ground,
Unless thy features do belie thee much,
Venedico 2 art thou. But what brings thee
Into this bitter seasoning Vs He replied :
" Unwillingly I answer to thy words.
But thy clear speech, that to my mind recalls
The world 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,
That not so many tongues this day are taught,
Betwixt the Reno and Savena's stream,
To answer Sipa 4 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

1 1 therefore stay'd."] "I piedi affissi" is the reading of the Nidobeatina
edition ; but Lombardi is under an error, when he tells us that the other
editions have "gli occhi affissi;" for Vellutello's at least, printed in 1544,
agrees with the Nidobeatina.

2 Venedico.] Venedico Caccianimico, a Bolognese, who prevailed on his
sister Ghisola to prostitute herself to Obizzo da Este, Marquis of Ferrara, whom
we have seen among the tyrants, Canto xii.

3 Seasoning.] Salse. Monti, in his Proposta, following Benvenuto da Imola,
takes this to be the name of a place. If so, a play must have been intended on
the word, which cannot be preserved in English.

4 To answer Sipa.] He denotes Bologna by its situation between the rivers
Savena to the east, and Reno to the west of that city ; and by a peculiarity of
dialect, the use of the affirmative sipa instead either of si, or, as Monti will have
it, of sia.

66— m. HELL, Canto XVIII. 85

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 !
Jason 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 x beguiled, a virgin young,
Who first had all the rest herself beguiled.
Impregnated, he left her there forlorn.
Such is the guilt condemns him to this pain.
Here too Medea's injuries are avenged.
All bear him company, who like deceit
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

1 Hypsipyte.] See Apollonius Rhodius, lib. 1. and Valerius Flaccus, lib. 2.
Hypsipyle deceived the other women, by concealing her father Thoas, when
they had agreed to put all their males to death.

THE VISION. 112—133.

Draff of the human body. There beneath
Searching with eye inquisitive, I mark'd
One with his head so grimed, 'twere 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,
" I heretofore have seen thee with dry locks ;
And thou Alessio l 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 farther stretch
Thy face, that thou the visage well mayst note
Of that besotted, sluttish courtezan,
Who there doth rend her with defiled nails,
Now crouching down, now risen on her feet.
Thai's 2 is this, the harlot, whose false lip
Answered her doting'paramour that ask'd,
1 Thankest me much.' — ' Say rather, wondrously ? '
And, seeing this, here satiate be our view."

CANTO XIX

glrgtrittfut

Tliey come to the third gulf, wherein are punished those who have been
guilty of simony. These are fixed with the head downwards 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 the Fifth,
whose evil deeds, together with those of other pontiffs, are bitterly repre-
hended. Virgil then carries him up again to the arch, which affords them
a passage over the following gulf.

Woe to thee, Simon Magus ! woe to you,

His wretched followers ! who the things of God,

Which should be wedded unto goodness, them,

1 Alessio."] Alessio, of an ancient and considerable family in Lucca, called
the Interminei.

2 Thais.] He alludes to that passage in the Eunuchus of Terence, where
Thraso asks if Thais was obliged to him for the present he had sent her ; and
Gnatho replies, that she had expressed her obligation in the most forcible
terms ;

T. Magnas vero agere gratias Thais mihi ?

G. Ingentes. Eun. act iii. sc. 1.

4-47. HELL, Canto XIX. 87

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 appeared
Than, in Saint John's fair dome l of me beloved,
Those framed to hold the pure baptismal streams,
One of the wrhich 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
The soles were burning ; whence the flexile joints
Glanced with such violent motion, as had snapt
Asunder cords or twisted withs. 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.

" If 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."

I then : " 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,

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.

88 THE VISION. 48—81.

Sad spirit ! thus reversed, and as a stake
Driven in the soil," I in these words began ;
" If 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,1
Calleth him back, whence death awhile delays.

He shouted : " Ha ! already standest there ?
Already standest there, 0 Boniface ! 2
By many a year the writing play'd me false.
So early dost thou surfeit with the wealth,
For which thou feared st not in guile 3 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,
' 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 woeful 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,4
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 dragg'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 questional. But already longer time

1 When fix'd.'] The commentators on Boccaccio's Decameron, p. 72, ediz.
Giunti, 1573, cite the words of the statute by which murderers were sentenced
thus to suffer at Florence. "Assassinus trahatur ad caudam muli seu asini
usque ad locum justitiae ; et ibidem plantetur capite deorsum, ita quod
moriatur." "Let the assassin be dragged at the tail of a mule or ass to the
place of justice ; and there let him be set in the ground with his face down-
ward, so that he die."

2 0 Boniface .'] The spirit mistakes Dante for Boniface VIII., who was then
alive ; and who he did not expect would have arrived so soon, in consequence,
as it should seem, of a prophecy, which predicted the death of that pope at a
later period. Boniface died in 1303.

3 In guile.] " Thou didst presume to arrive by fraudulent means at the
papal power, and afterwards to abuse it."

4 In the mighty mantle I was robed.] Nicholas III. of the Orsini family,
whom the Poet therefore calls "figliuol dell' orsa," "son of the she-bear." He
died in 1281.

K2— 109. HELL, Canto XIX. 89

Hath past, since my soles kindled, and I thus
Uptum'd have stood, than is his doom to stand
Planted with fiery feet. For after him,
One yet of deeds more udy shall arrive,
From forth the west, a shepherd without law,1
Fated to cover both his form and mine.
He a new Jason2 shall he call'd, of whom
In Maccabees we read ; and favour such
As to that priest his king indulgent show'd,
Shall be of France's monarch 3 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
[nto his charge ? Surely he ask'd no more
But ' Follow me ! ' Nor Peter,4 nor the rest,
Or gold or silver of Matthias took,
When lots were cast upon the forfeit place
Of the condemned soul.5 Abide thou then ;
Thy punishment of right is merited :
And look thou well to that ill-gotten coin,
Which against Charles G 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 8

1 From forth the west, a shepherd without law.] Bertrand de Got, Arch-
bishop of Bourdeaux, 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.

2 A new Jason.'] " But after the death of Seleucus, when Antiochus, called
Epiphanes, took the kingdom, Jason, the brother of Onias, laboured underhand
to be high-priest, promising unto the king, by intercession, three hundred and
threescore talents of silver, and of another revenue eighty talents." 2 Maccah.
iv. 7, 8.

3 Of France's monarch.] Philip IV. of France. See G. Villani, lib. 8.
cap. lxxx.

4 Nor Peter.] Acts of the Apostles, i. 26.

5 The condemned soul.] Judas.

6 Against Charles.] Nicholas III. was enraged against Charles I. King of
Sicily, because he rejected with scorn a proposition made by that pope for an
alliance between their families. See G. Villani, Hist. lib. 7. cap. liv.

7 Underfoot.] So shall the world go on,

To good malignant, to bad men benign.

Milton, P. L. b. 12. 538.

8 The Evangelist.] Revelation, xvii. 1, 2, 3. — Petrarch, in one of his Epistles,
had his eye on these lines: " Qaude (inquam) et ad aliquid utilis mventa
gloriare bonorum hostis et malwum hospes, atque asylum pessima rerum
Babylon fcris, Rhodani ripis imposita, famosa dicam an infamis vieretrix,

90 THE VISION. 110-118.

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 1
Ah, Constantine ! l to how much ill gave birth,

fornicata cum regibus terrce. Ilia equidem ipsa es quam in spiritu sacer vidit
Evangelista. Ilia eadem, inquam, es, non alia, sedens super aquas multas,
sive ad littora tribus cincta fluminibus sive rerum atque divitiarum turba
tnortalium quibus lasciviens ac secura insides opum immemor oeternarum sive
ut idem qui vidit, exposuit. Populi et gentes et linguae aqute sunt, super quas
meretrix sedes, recognosce habitum," etc. Petrarchce Opera, ed. fol. Basil.
1554. Epist. sine titulo Liber, ep. xvi. p. 729. The text is here probably
corrupted. The construction certainly may be rendered easier by omitting the
ad before littora, and substituting a comma for a full stop after exposuit.
"With all the respect that is due to a venerable prelate and truly learned critic,
I cannot but point out a mistake he has fallen into, relating to this passage,
when he observes, that " Numberless passages in the writings of Petrarch
speak of Rome under the name of Babylon. But an equal stress is not to be
laid on all these. It should be remembered, that the popes, in Petrarch's
time, resided at Avignon, greatly to the disparagement of themselves, as he
thought, and especially of Rome ; of which this singular man was little less
than idolatrous. The situation of the place, surrounded by waters, and his
splenetic concern for the exiled church (for under this idea he painted to him-
self the pope's migration to the banks of Avignon), brought to his mind the
condition of the Jewish church in the Babylonian captivity. And this parallel
was all, perhaps, that he meant to insinuate in most of those passages. But
when he applies the prophecies to Rome, as to the Apocalyptic Babylon (as he
clearly does in the epistle under consideration), his meaning is not equivocal,
and we do him but justice to give him an honourable place among the testes
VERiTATis." An Introduction to the Study of the Prophecies, etc., by Richard
Hurd, D.D., serm. vii. p. 239, note y, ed. 1772. Now, a reference to the
words printed in italics, which the Bishop of Worcester has omitted in his
quotation, will make it sufficiently evident, that Avignon, and not Rome, is
here alluded to by Petrarch. The application that is made of these prophecies
by two men so eminent for their learning and sagacity as Dante and Petrarch
is, however, very remarkable, and must be satisfactory to those who have re-
nounced the errors and corruptions of the papacy. Such applications were
indeed frequent in the Middle Ages, as may be seen in the " Sermons " above
referred to. Balbo observes, that it is not Rome, as most erroneously inter-
preted, but Avignon, and the court there, that is termed Babylon by Dante
and Petrarch. Vita di Dante, vol. ii. p. 103.

1 Ah, Constantine /] He alludes to the pretended gift of the Lateran by
Constantine to Sylvester, of which Dante himself seems to imply a doubt, in
his treatise De Monarchic : " Ergo scindere Imperium, Imperatori non
licet. Si ergo aliquae dignitates per Constantinum essent alienatse (ut dicunt)
ab Imperio," etc., lib. 3. " Therefore to make a rent in the empire exceeds
the lawful power of the emperor himself. If, then, some dignities were by
Constantine alienated (as they report) from the empire," etc. In another part
of the same treatise he speaks of the alienation with less doubt indeed, but not
with less disapprobation : "0 felicem populum ! 0 Ausoniam te gloriosam !
si vel numquam infirmator imperii tui extitisset ; vel numquam sua pia intentio
ipsum fefellisset." — " 0 happy people ! 0 glorious Italy ! if either he who

119—135. HELL, Canto XX. 91

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
Upon the rugged rock and steep, a path
Not easy for the clambering goat to mount.

Thence to my view another vale appealed.

CANTO XX.

^trgitmcnt.

The Poet relates the punishment of such as presumed, while living, to predict
future events. It is to have their faces reversed and set the contrary way
on their limbs, so that, being deprived of the power to see before them, they
are constrained ever to walk backwards. Among these Virgil points out
to him Amphiaraus, Tiresias, Aruns, and Man to (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.

And now the verse proceeds to torments new,
Fit argument of this the twentieth strain
Of the first song, whose awful theme records

thus weakened thine empire had never been born, or had never Buffered his
own pious intentions to mislead him." Lib. 2. ad Jinem. The gift is by
Ariosto very humorously placed in the moon, among the things lost or abused
on earth :

Di varj fiori ad un gran monte passa,

Ch' ebber gia buono odore, or puzzan forte,

Questo era il dono (se pero dir lece)

Che Costantino al buon Silvestro fece. Orl. Fur. c. xxxiv. st. 80.

Milton has translated both this passage and that in the text. Prose Works,
vol. i. p. 11, ed. 1753.

Ah, Constantine ! of how much ill was cause
Not thy conversion, but those rich domains
That the first wealthy pope receiv'd of thee.
Then pass'd he to a flowery mountain green,
Which once smelt sweet, now stinks as odiously ;
This was that gift, if you the truth will have,
That Constantine to good Silvester gave.

92 THE VISION. 4—30.

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 x
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,2 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
I leant and wept, so that my guide exclaim'd :
" Whg,t, and art thou, too, witless as the rest ?
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 3 earth gaped in Thebes, when all

1 Reversed.] But very uncouth sight was to behold
How lie did fashion his untoward pace ;
For as he forward mov'd his footing old,
So backward still was turn'd his wrinkled face ;
Unlike to men, who, ever as they trace,
Both feet and face one way are wont to lead.

Spenser, Faery Queen, b. 1. c. viii. st. 31.

2 How I long

Could keep my visage dry.]

Sight so deform what heart of man could long
Dry -eyed behold ? Adam could not, but wept.

Milton, P. L. b. 11. 495.
3 Before whose eyes.] Amphiaraiis, one of the seven kings who besieged
Thebes. He is said to have been swallowed up by an opening of the earth.
See Lidgate's Storie of Thebes, part iii., where it is told how the "Bishop
Amphiaraiis " fell down to hell :

And thus the devill, for his outrages,
Like his desert payed him his wages.
A different reason for his being doomed thus to perish, is assigned by
Pindar : i S' 'A^ta.^, etc. Nem. ix.

For thee, Amphiaraiis, earth, Or ever on thy back the spear

By Jove's all-riving thunder cleft, Of Periclymenus impress'd

Her mighty bosom open'd wide, A wound to shame thy warlike breast.

Thee and thy plunging steeds to hide, For struck with panic fear

The gods' own children flee.

31—61. HELL, Canto XX. 93

Cried out ' Amphiaraiis, whither rush est ?
Why leavest thou the war 1 ' He not the less
Fell ruining l 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 2 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,3 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,4 she who searcli'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

1 Ruining.] "Ruinare." Hence, perhaps, Milton, P. L. b. 6. 8b'8 :

Heaven ruining from heaven.

2 Tiresias.] Duo magnorum viridi coeuntia sylva

Corpora serpentina baculi violaverat ictu,
Deque viro factus (mirabile) foemina, septem
Egerat autumnos. Octavo rursus eosdem
Vidit. Et, est vestrae si tanta potentia plaga?,
Nunc quoque vos feriam. Percussis anguibus isdeni
Forma prior rediit, genitivaque venit imago.

Ovid, Met. lib. 3.

■ Aruns.] Aruns is said to have dwelt in the mountains of Luni (from
whence that territory is still called Lunigiana), above Carrara, celebrated for
its marble. Lucan, Phars. lib. 1. 575. So Boccaccio, in the Fiammctta,
lil). 3: "Quale Arunte," etc. "Like Aruns, who amidst the white marbles
of Luni contemplated the celestial bodies and their motions." Compare
Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 3. cap. vi.

4 Manto.] The daughter of Tiresias of Thebes, a city dedicated to Bacchus.
From Manto, Mantua, the country of Virgil, derives its name. The Poet pro-
ceeds to describe the situation of that place. But see the note to Purgatory,
Canto xxii. v. 112.

94 THE VISION. 62—88.

Camonica 1 and Garda, issuing forth,

Water the Apennine. There is a spot 2

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 3

Peschiera 4 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 lived, and left

Her body tenantless. Thenceforth the tribes,

Who round were scattered, gathering to that place,

Assembled ; for its strength was great, enclosed

1 Camonica.'] Lombardi, instead of

Fra Garda, e val Camonica e Apennino,
reads

Fra Garda e val Camonica Pennino,
from the Nidobeatina edition (to which he might have added that of Vellutello
in 1544), and two MSS., all of which omit the second conjunction, the only
part of the alteration that affects the sense. I have re-translated the passage,
which in the former editions stood thus :

which a thousand rills

Methinks, and more, water between the vale

Camonica and Garda, and the height

Of Apennine remote.
It should be added, that Vellutello reads " Valdimonica " for "Val Camon-
ica ; " but which of these is right remains to be determined by a collation of
editions and MSS. , and still more perhaps by a view of the country in the
neighbourhood of the lake (now called the Lago di Garda), with a referenoe to
this passage.

2 There is a spot.] Prato di Fame, where the dioceses of Trento, Verona,
and Brescia meet.

3 A garrison of goodly site and strong.]

Gaza, bello e forte arnese
Da fronteggiar i regni di Soria. Tasso, Ger. Lib. c. i. st. 67.

4 Peschiera.] A garrison situated to the south of the lake, where it empties
itself and forms the Mincius.

89—115. HELL, Canto XX. 95

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 l by deceit

Was wrong'd of Pinamonte. If thou hear

Henceforth another origin 2 assign'd

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
Grrccia 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,3
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,4
Practised in every slight of magic wile.

1 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.

2 Another origin.] Lombardi refers to Servius on the Tenth Book of the
jSndd, Alii a Tarchone Tyrrheni fratre conditam dicunt Mantuam autem
ideo nominatam quia Etrusca lingua Mantum ditem patrem appellant.

3 So sings my tragic strain.]

Suspensi Eurypilum scitatum oracula Phoebi

Mittimus. Virg. ^Eneid, ii. 14.

4 Michael Scot.] " Egli non ha ancora guari, che in questa citta fu un gran
maestro in negromanzia, il quale ebbe nome Michele Scotto, percio che di
Scozia era." Boccaccio, Dec. Giorn. viii. Nov. 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." See also Giov. Villani, Hist,
lib. 10. cap. cv. and cxli. and lib. 12. cap. xviii. ; and Fazio degli Uberti,
Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xxvii. I make no apology for adding the following
curious particulars extracted from the notes to Mr. Scott's Lay of the Last
Minstrel, a poem in which a happy use is made of the superstitions relating
to the subject of this note. " Sir Michael Scott, of Balwearie, flourished
during the thirteenth century, and was one of the ambassadors sent to bring
the Maid of Norway to Scotland upon the death of Alexander TTT. He was a

96 THE VISION. 116—182.

" Guido Bonatti l see : Asdente 2 mark,
Who now were willing lie 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 :

man of much learning, chiefly acquired in foreign countries. He wrote a
commentary upon Aristotle, printed at Venice in 1496, and several treatises
upon natural philosophy, from which he appears to have been addicted to the
abstruse studies of judicial astrology, alchymy, physiognomy, and chiromancy.
Hence he passed among his contemporaries for a skilful magician. Dempster
informs us, that he remembers to have heard in his youth, that the magic
books of Michael Scott were still in existence, but could not be opened with-
out danger, on account of the fiends who were thereby invoked. Dcmpsteri
Historia Ecclesiastics, 1627, lib. 12. p. 495. Leslie characterizes Michael
Scott as 'Singulari philosophise astronomic ac medicinse laude prastans,
dicebatur penitissimos magiae recessus indagasse.' A personage thus spoken
of by biographers and historians loses little of his mystical fame in vulgar
tradition. Accordingly, the memory of Sir Michael Scott survives in many
a legend ; and in the south of Scotland any work of great labour and antiquity
is ascribed either to the agency of Auld Michael, of Sir William Wallace, or of
the devil. Tradition varies concerning the place of his burial : some contend
for Holme Coltrame in Cumberland, others for Melrose Abbey ; but all agree
that his books of magic were interred in his grave, or preserved in the convent
where he died." The Lay of the Last Minstrel, by Walter Scott, Esq. Lond.
4to, 1805, p. 234, Notes. Mr. Warton, speaking of the new translations of
Aristotle, from the original Greek into Latin, about the twelfth century,
observes : "I believe the translators understood very little Greek. Our
countryman, Michael Scotus, was one of the first of them ; who was assisted
by Andrew, a Jew. Michael was astrologer to Frederick II., Emperor of
Germany, and appears to have executed his translations at Toledo in Spain,
about the year 1220. These new versions were perhaps little more than cor-
rections from those of the early Arabians, made under the inspection of the
learned Spanish Saracens." History of English Poetry, vol. i. dissert, ii. and
sec. 9, p. 292. Among the Canonici MSS. in the Bodleian, I have seen
(No. 520) the astrological works of Michael Scot, on vellum, with an illumin-
ated portrait of him at the beginning.

1 Guido Bonatti.] An astrologer of Forli, on whose skill Guido da Monte-
feltro, lord of that place, so much relied, 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 mentions him in the History of Florence, lib.
1. p. 24, ed. 1550. "He flourished about 1230 and 1260. Though a learned
astronomer, he was seduced by astrology, through which he was greatly in
favour with many princes of that time. His many works are miserably spoiled
by it." Bettinelli, Risorgimento d' Italia, t. i. p. 118, 8vo, 1786. He is
referred to in Brown's Vulgar Errors, b. 4. ch. xii.

2 Asdente.] A shoemaker at Parma, who deserted his business to practise
the arts of divination. How much this man had attracted the public notice
appears from a passage in our author's Convito, p. 179, where it is said, in
speaking of the derivation of the word " noble," that " if those who were best
known were accounted the most noble, Asdente, the shoemaker of Parma,
would be more noble than any one in that city."

123—128. HELL, Canto XXI. 97

For now doth Cain with fork of thorns J confine

On either hemisphere, touching the wave

Beneatli 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.

CANTO XXI.

Still in the eighth circle, which bears the name of Malebolge, they look down
from the bridge that passes over its fifth gulf, upon 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.

Thus 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' arsenal2 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 mizen one repairs, and mainsail rent ;
So, not by force of fire but art divine,

1 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 superstition is alluded to in the Paradise, Canto ii. 52. The curious
reader may consult Brand on Popular Antiquities, 4to, 1813, vol. ii. p. 476,
and Douce's Illustrations of Shakspeare, 8vo, 1807, vol. i. p. 16.

2 In the Venetians' arsenal.]

Come dentr'ai Navai della gran terra,

Tra le lacune del mar d'Adria posta,

Serban la pece la togata gente,

Ad uso di lor navi e di lor triremi ;

Per solcar poi sicuri il mare ondoso, etc. Ruccellai, Le Api, v. 165.

Dryden seems to have had the passage in the text before him in his Annus
Mirabilis, st. 146, etc.

G

98 THE VISION. 17—49.

Boil'd * here a glutinous thick mass, that round
Limed all the shore beneath. I that beheld,
But therein nought distinguish'd, save the bubbles
Raised by the boiling, and one mighty swell
Heave,2 and by turns subsiding fall. While there
I fix'd my ken below, " Mark ! mark ! " my guide
Exclaiming, drew me towards 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
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.3 Him
Whelm ye beneath, while I return for more.
That land hath store of such. All men are there,
Except Bonturo, barterers : 4 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 5 saves not : here
Is other swimming than in Serchio's wave,6
Wherefore, if thou desire we rend thee not,

1 Boil'd.] Vidi flumen magno de Inferno procedere ardens, atque piceum.
Alberici Visio, sec. 17.

2 One mighty swell

Heave.] Vidi etiam os putei magnum flammas emittentem, et nunc sursum
nunc deorsum descendentem. Alberici Visio, sec. 11.

3 One of Santa Zita's elders.] The elders or chief magistrates of Lucca,
where Santa Zita was held in especial veneration. The name of this sinner is
supposed to have been Martino Botaio.

* Except Bonturo, barterers.] This is said ironically of Bonturo de' Dati.
By barterers are meant peculators, of every description ; all who traffic the
interests of the public for their own private advantage.

5 The hallow'd visage.] A representation of the head of our Saviour wor-
shipped at Lucca.

6 Is other swimming than in Serchio's wave.]

Qui si nuota altrimenti che nel Serchio.
Serchio is the river that flows by Lucca. So Pulci, Morg. Magg. c. xxiv. :
Qui si nuota nel sangue, e non nel Serchio.

50—92. HELL, Canto XXI. 99

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 secret mayst thou filch."
E'en thus the cook bestirs him, with his grooms,
To thrust the flesh x into the caldron down
With flesh-hooks, that it float not on the top.

Me then my guide bespake : " Lest they descry
That thou art here, behind a craggy rock
Bend low and skreen thee : and whate'er of force
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 tine
Dare seize me, come forth from amongst you one,
Who having 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 1 " he exclaim'd.

" Belie vest thou, Malacoda ! I had come
Thus far from all your skirmishing secure,7'
My teacher answer'd, " without will divine
And destiny propitious 1 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 towards 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,2 once I saw

1 The flesh.'] In euudem flumen corruunt : rursumque assurgentes, ac clenuo
recidentes, tamdiu ibidem cruciantur, donee in morera carnium excocti, etc.
Alberici Visio, sec. 17.

2 From Caprona.] The surrender of the castle of Caprona to the combined
forces of Florence and Lucca, on condition that the garrison should march out
in safety, to which event Dante was a witness, took place in 1290. See G.
Villani, Hist. lib. 7. cap. exxxvi.

100 THE VISION. 93-117.

Th5 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.
Yesterday,1 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 dispatch
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 2 thou !

1 Yesterday."] This passage fixes the era of Dante's descent at Good Friday,
in the year 1300 (34 years from our blessed Lord's incarnation being added to
1266), and at the thirty-fifth year of our Poet's age. See Canto i. v. 1. The
awful event alluded to, the Evangelists inform us, happened " at the ninth
hour," that is, our sixth, when "the rocks were rent," and the convulsion,
according to Dante, was felt even in the depths of Hell. See Canto xii. v. 38.

2 Cagnazzo.'] Pulci introduces some of these demons in a very pleasant adven-
ture, related near the beginning of the second Canto of his Morgante Maggiore :

Non senti tu, Orlando, in quella tomba

Quelle parole, che colui rimbomba ?

Io voglio andar a scoprir quello avello,

La dove e' par che quella voce s'oda,

Ed escane Cagnazzo, e Farfarello,

0 Libicocco, col suo Malacoda ;

E finalmente s'accostava a quello,

Pero che Orlando questa impresa loda,

E disse ; scuopri, se vi fussi dentro

Quanti ne piovon mai dal ciel nel centro. Stanze 30, 1.

" Perceivest the words, Orlando, which this fellow

Doth in our ears out of that tomb rebellow ?

I'll go, and straight the sepulchre uncase,

From whence, as seems to me, that voice was heard ;

Be Farfarel and Cagnazzo to my face,

Or Libicoc with Malacoda, stirr'd : "

And finally he drew near to the place ;

The emprize Orlando praising with this word :

" Uncase it, though within as many dwell,

As ever were from heaven rain'd down to hell."

118—137. HELL, Canto XXII. 101

The troop of ten let Barbariccia lead.

With Libicocco, Draghinazzo haste,

Fang'd Ciriatto. Graffiacane 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 : " 0 master ! x 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 :
" I charge thee, fear not : let them, as they will,
Gnarl on : 'tis out 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 2 triumphant gave.

CANTO XXII.

JLrgnmcnt.

Virgil and Dante proceed, accompanied by the Demons, and see other sinners
of the same description in the same gulf. The device of Ciampolo, one of
these, to escape from the Demons, who had laid hold on him.

It 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,3 or signals made from castled heights,

1 0 master!] Lombardi tells ns that every edition, except his favourite Nido-
beatina, has " 0 me " printed separately, instead of " Orae." This is not the
case at least with Landino's of 1484. But there is no end of these inaccuracies.

- With sound obscene.] Compare the original with Aristophanes, Xnbes,
165:—

3 Tabors.] " Tabour, a drum, a common accompaniment of war, is mentioned
as one of the instruments of martial music in this battle (in Richard Cceur-de-
Liou) with characteristical propriety. It was imported into the European armies

102 THE VISION. 10—43.

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 company ! but in the church 1
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,2 and those
Who burn'd within. As dolphins 3 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
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 befals that oft one frog remains,
While the next springs away : and Gramacan,4
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. " 0 Rubicant !
See that his hide thou with thy talons flay,"
Shouted together all the cursed crew.

Then I : " Inform thee, Master ! if thou may,

from the Saracens in the holy war. Joinville describes a superb bark or
galley belonging to a Saracen chief, which, he says, was filled with cymbals,
tabours, and Saracen horns. Hist, de S. Loys, p. 30." Warton's Hist, of
Eng. Poetry, vol. i. sec. 4, p. 167.

1 In the church.'] This proverb is repeated by Pulci, Morg. Magg. c. xvii.

2 Whate'er the chasm contain'd.] Monti, in his Proposta, interprets "con-
tegno" to mean, not "contents" but "state," "condition."

3 As dolphins.] li lieti delfini

Givan saltando sopra l'onde chiare,
Che soglion di fortuna esser divini.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 1. cap. xv.

4 Graffiacan.] Fuseli, in a note to his third Lecture, observes, that "the
Minos of Dante, in Messer Biagio da Cesena, and his Charon, have been recog-
nised by all ; but less the shivering wretch held over the barge by a hook, and
evidently taken from this passage." He is speaking of Michael Augelo's Last
Judgment.

44-69. HELL, Canto XXII. 103

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,1
My mother placed me in a lord's retinue ;
For she had borne me to a losel vile,
A spendthrift of his substance and himself.
The good king Thibault 2 after that I served : 3
To peculating here my thoughts were turn'd,
Whereof I give account in this dire heat."

Straight Ciriatto, 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 ;
Knowest thou any sprung of Latian 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 ;

1 Born in Navarre's domain.] The name of this peculator is said to have
been Ciampolo.

2 The good king Thibault.] "Thibault I., king of Navarre, died on the 8th
of June, 1233, as much to be commended for the desire he showed of aiding
the war in the Holy Land, as reprehensible and faulty for his 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 exercise 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 composi-
tions publicly in his palace, that they might be criticised by all." Mariana,
History of Spain, b. 13. cap. ix. An account of Thibault, and two of his songs,
with what were probably the original melodies, may be seen in Dr. Burney's
History of Music, vol. ii. cap. iv. His poems, which are in the French language,
were edited by M. l'Eveque de la Ravalliere. Paris, 1742, 2 vols. 12mo. Dante
twice quotes one of his verses in the Treatise de Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap. ix. and
lib. 2. cap. v., and refers to him again, lib. 2. cap. vi. From "the good king
Thibault " are descended the good, but more unfortunate monarch, Louis XVI.
of France, and consequently the present legitimate sovereign of that realm.
See Henault, Abrege Chron. 1252, 3, 4.

3 I served.] Again Lombardi misrepresents the readings of other editions, as
he does throughout this Canto in several instances, wherein he professes to
follow that which he has selected for his model ; but, as these varieties regard
certain delicacies of the original language, and do not affect the sense, I shall
not trouble my readers by noticing them.

104 THE VISION. 70—111.

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

Kestrain'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 earnest to shore ? " —

" It 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.2
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,
Kebuked 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,
So that no vengeance they may fear from them,
And I, remaining in this self-same place,
Will, for myself but one, make seven appear,
When my shrill whistle shall be heard : for so
Our custom is to call each other up."

Cagnazzo at that word deriding grinn'd,
Then wagg'd the head and spake : " Hear his device,
Mischievous as he is, to plunge 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,

1 The friar Gomita.'] He was intrusted by Nino de' Visconti with the
government of Gallura, one of the four jurisdictions into which Sardinia was
divided. Having his master's enemies in his power, he took a bribe from them,
and allowed them to escape. Mention of Nino will recur in the Notes to Canto
xxxiii , and in the Purgatory, Canto viii.

2 Michel Zanche.'] The president of Logodoro, another of the four Sardinian
jurisdictions. See Canto xxxiii. Note to v. 136.

112—148. HELL, Canto XXII. 105

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,
Planted his feet on land, and at one leap
Escaping, disappointed their resolve.

Them quick resentment stung, but him the most,
Who was the cause of failure : 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 :
E'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
Was umpire 1 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 dispatch'd
From the other coast, with all their weapons arm'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.

1 Umpire.] Scliermidor. The reader, if he thinks it worth while, may con-
sult the Proposta of Monti on this word, which, with Lombardi, he would alter
to sghermitor.

106 THE VISION. 1—31.

#

CANTO XXIII.

JUgttmntt.

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, Catalano and Loderingo, knights of Saint Mary, otherwise
called Joyous Friars of Bologna. Cai'aphas is seen fixed to a cross on the
ground, and lies so stretched along the way, that all tread on him in
passing.

In 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 iEsop's fable,1 where he told
What fate unto the mouse and frog befel ;
For language hath not sounds more like in sense,
Than are these chances, if the origin
And end of each be needfully 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
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 1 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

1 JEsojfs fable.] The fable of the frog, who offered to carry the mouse across
a ditch, with the intention of drowning him, when both were carried off by a
kite. It is not among those Greek fables which go under the name of ^Esop.

32—72. HELL, Canto XXIII. 107

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 1 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,
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.
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.2 Their outside
Was overlaid with gold, dazzling to view,
But leaden all within, and of such weight,
That Frederick's 3 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 tainting people, that our company
Was changed, at every movement of the step.

1 He had not spoke."] Cumque ego cum angelis relictus starem pavidus. unus
OX illis tartareis ministris horridis (Qu. horridus?) hispidis (Qu. hispidus?)
aspectuque procerus festinus adveniens me impellere, et quomodocumque
nocere conabatur : cum ecce apostolus velocius accurrens, meque subito
arripiens in quendam locum gloriose projecit visionis. Alberici Visio, sec. 15.

2 Monks in Cologne.-] They wore their cowls unusually large.

3 Frederick's.] The Emperor Frederick II. is said to have punished those
who were guilty of high treason by wrapping them up in lead, and casting
them into a furnace.

108 THE VISION. 73—104.

"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 £>ace 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 narrrow 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,
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," 1
One of them answer'd, " are so leaden gross,
That with their weight they make the balances
To crack beneath them. Joyous friars 2 we were,

1 Our bonnets gleaming bright with orange hue.] It is observed by Veuturi,
that the word "ranee" does not here signify "rancid or disgustful," as it is
explained by the old commentators, but " orange-coloured," in which sense it
occurs in the Purgatory, Canto ii. 9. By the erroneous interpretation Milton
appears to have been misled : ' ' Ever since the day peepe, till now the sun
Avas grown somewhat ranke." Prose Works, vol. i. p. 160, ed. 1753.

2 Joyous friars.] " Those who ruled the city of Florence on the part of the
Ghibellines perceiving this discontent and murmuring, which they were fearful
might produce a rebellion against themselves, in order to satisfy the people,
made choice of two knights, Prati Godenti (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 Guelph,
the other of the Ghibelline party. It is to be remarked, that the Joyous
Friars were called Knights of St. Mary, and became 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 defend widows and orphans ;
they were to act as mediators ; they had internal regulations, 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

105-138. HELL, Canto XXIII. 109

Bologna's natives ; Catalano I,

He Loderingo named ; and by thy land

Together taken, as men used to take

A single and indifferent arbiter,

To reconcile their strifes. How there we sped,

Gardingo's vicinage * can best declare."

" 0 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,2 whom intent
Thou view'st, was he who gave the Pharisees
Counsel, that it were fitting for one man
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,3 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 4 circle moving, which o'ersteps
Each vale of horror, save that here his cope

appellation given them, and were found to be more bent ~on enjoying them-
selves 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 dependence placed on the
character of their order, that it was expected they would be impartial, and
would save the commonwealth any unnecessary expense ; instead of which,
though inclined to opposite parties, they secretly and hypocritically concurred
in promoting their own advantage rather than the public good." G. Villani,
lib. 7. cap. xiii. This happened in 1266.

1 Gardingo's vicinage.) The name of that part of the city which was
inhabited by the powerful Ghibelline family of the Uberti, and destroyed
under the partial and iniquitous administration of Catalano and Loderingo.

2 That pierced spirit.] Cai'aphas.

3 The father of his consort.] Annas, father-in-law to Cai'aphas.

4 Great] In the former editions it was printed "next." The error was
observed by Mr. Carlyle.

110 THE VISION. 139-151.

Is shattered. 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,1
Who yonder hangs the sinners on his hook."

To whom the friar : " At Bologna erst
I many vices of the devil heard ;
Among the rest was said, ' He is a liar,2
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.

CANTO XXIV.

,3ln)trmcttt.

Under the escort of his faithful master, Dante, not without 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 Saint James in Pistoia, predicts some calamities
that impended over that city, and over the Florentines.

In the year's early nonage,3 when the sun
Tempers his tresses in Aquarius' urn,
And now towards equal day the nights recede ;
Whenas the rime upon the earth puts on
Her dazzling sister's image,4 but not long
Her milder sway endures ; then riseth up
The village hind, whom fails his wintry store,5
And looking out beholds the plain around
All whiten'd ; whence impatiently he smites
His thighs, and to his hut returning in,

1 He warn'd us ill.] He refers to the falsehood told him by the demon.
Canto xxi. 108.

2 He is a liar.] " He is a liar and the father of it." John viii. 44.
Dante had perhaps heard this text from one of the pulpits in Bologna.

3 In the year's early nonage.] " At the latter part of January, when the
sun enters into Aquarius, and the equinox is drawing near, when the hoar-
frosts in the morning often wear the appearance of snow, but are melted by
the rising sun."

4 Her dazzling sister's image.] Xtyvlv piXxivav, xio\w tv^cs xao-iv.

^Eschyl. Septem Contra Tliebas, v. 490. Blomfield's edit.

xi,ffH

tmXov tCvov$6s, h-^iec. xevts. ^Eschyl. Agamemnon, v. 478. Blomfield.

5 Whom Jails his wintry store.] A cui la roba manca.
So in the Purgatorio, c. xiii. 61 :

Cosi gli ciechi a cui la roba manca.

11—46. HELL, Canto XXIV. Ill

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, towards me with a look as sweet,

He turn'd him back, as that I first beheld

At the steep mountain's foot. Eegarding 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 labour'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,"

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 farther, but did seat me there.

" Now needs thy best of man ; " so spake my guide :
" For not on downy plumes,2 nor under shade

1 From whence.] Mr. Carlyle notes the mistake in my former translation ;
and I have corrected it accordingly.

2 Not on doivny plumes.]

Lettor, tu dei pensar che, senza ardire,
Senza affanno soffrir, l'uomo non puote
Fama acquistar, ne gran cose fornire.

Fazio degli Uberti, Bittamondo, lib. 4. cap. iv.
Nessun mai per fuggir, o per riposo,
Venne in altezza fama ower in gloria.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. ii.

Signor, non sotto l'ombra in piaggia molle

Tra fonti e fior, tra Ninfe e tra Sirene,

Ma in cima all'erto e faticoso colle

Delia virtu riposto e il nostro bene. Tasso, G. L. c. xvii. st. 61.

112 THE VISION. 47—86.

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 1
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
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 nought 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 2 terrible, so strange of shape
And hideous, that remembrance in my veins
Yet shrinks the vital current. Of her sands 3
Let Lybia vaunt no more : if Jaculus,
Pareas and Chelyder be her brood,
Cenchris and Amphisbsena, plagues so dire
Or in such numbers swarming ne'er she show'd,

1 Vanquish thy weariness.]

Quiii corpus ormstum

Hesternis vitiis animuni quoque praegravat una,

Atque affigit humi divinae particulam aurse. Hor. Sat. ii. lib. 2. 78.

2 Serpents.] Vidi locum horridum tenebrosum fcetoribus exhalantibus

flammis crepitantibus serpentibus, draconibus repletum. Alberici

Visio, sec. 12.

3 0/ her sands.] Compare Lucan, Phars. lib. 9. 703.

87— 10U HELL, Canto XXIV. 113

Not with all Ethiopia, and whate'er
Above the Erythraean 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 J 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 0 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,2 when five hundred years
Have well-nigh circled, dies, and springs forthwith
Renascent : blade nor herb throughout his life

1 Heliotrope.] Viridi colore est (gemma heliotropion) non ita acuto sed
nubilo magis et represso, stellis puniceis superspersa. Causa nominis de
effectu lapidis est et potestate. Dejecta in labris ameis radios solis mutat
sanguineo repercussu, utraque aqua splendorem aeris abjicit et avertit. Etiam
illud posse dicitur, ut herba ejusdem nominis mixta et prascantationibus
legitimis consecrata, eum, a quocunque gestabitur, subtrahat visibus obviorum.
Solinus, c. xl. " A stone," says Boccaccio, in his humorous tale of Calan-
drino, "which we lapidaries call heliotrope, of such extraordinary virtue, that
the bearer of it is effectually concealed from the sight of all present." Decam.
G. viii. N. 3. In Chiabrera's Ruggiero, Scaltrimento begs of Sofia, who is
sending him on a perilous errand, to lend him the heliotrope :

In mia man fida

L'elitropia, per cui possa involarmi

Secondo il mio talento agli occhi altrui. c. vi.

Trust to my hand the heliotrope, by which
I may at will from others' eyes conceal me.

Compare Ariosto, II Negromante, act iii. sc. 3 ; Pulci, Morg. Magg. c. xxv. ;
and Fortiguerra, Ricciardetto, c. x. st. 17. Gower, in his Confessio Amantis,
lib. 7., enumerates it among the jewels in the diadem of the sun :

Jaspis and helitropius.

2 The Arabian Phamix.] This is translated from Ovid, Metam. lib. 15. :

Una est quae reparat, seque ipsa reseminat ales ;
Assyrii Phcenica vocant. Nee fruge neque herbis
Sed thuris lacrymis, et succo vivit amomi.
Haec ubi quinque sure complevit secula vita?,
Ilicis in ramis, tremulaeve cacumine palmae,
Unguibus et pando nidum sibi construit ore.
Qua simul ut casias, et nardi lenis aristas,
Quassaque cum fulva substravit cinnama myrrha,
Se super imponit, finitque in odoribus sevum.
See also Petrarch, Canzone : Qual piu, etc.

H

114 THE VISION. 107—142.

He tastes, but tears of frankincense J alone
And odorous amomum : swaths of nard
- And myrrh his funeral shroud. As one that falls,
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,2
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 3 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 hither : once
A man I knew him, choleric and bloody."

The sinner heard and feign'd not, but towards 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 4 pines ;

1 Tears of frankincense.] Incenso e mirra e quello onde si pasce.

Fazio degli 'Uberti, Dittamondo, in a gorgeous description of the Phoenix,
lib. 2. cap. v.

2 Gazeth around.] Su mi levai senza far piu parole,

Cogli occhi intorno stupido mirando,
Si come l'Epilentico far suole.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. iii.

3 Vanni Fucci.] He is said to have been an illegitimate offspring of the
family of Lazari in Pistoia, and, having robbed the sacristy of the church of
St. James in that city, to have charged Vanni della Nona with the sacrilege ;
in consequence of which accusation the latter suffered death.

4 Pistoia.] " In May 1301, the Bianchi party of Pistoia, with the assistance
and favour of the Bianchi, who ruled Florence, drove out the party of the Neri
from the former place, destroying their houses, palaces, and farms." Giov.
Villani, Hist. lib. 8. cap. xliv.

143—150. HELL, Canto XXV. 115

Then Florence l changeth citizens and laws ;
From Valdimagra,2 drawn by wrathful Mars,
A vapour 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 breath-
ing forth fire. Our Poet then meets with the spirits of three of his
countrymen, two of whom undergo a marvellous transformation in his
presence.

When he had spoke, the sinner raised his hands 3
Pointed in mockery, and cried : " Take them, God !

1 Then Florence.] " Soon after the Biauchi will be expelled from Florence,
the Neri will prevail, and the laws and people will be changed."

2 From Valdimagra.] The commentators explain this prophetical threat to
allude to the victory obtained by the Marquis Morello Malaspina of Valdimagra
(a tract of country now called the Lunigiana), who put himself at the head of
the Neri, and defeated their opponents, the Bianchi, in the Campo Piceno near
Pistoia, soon after the occurrence related in the preceding Note on v. 142. Of
this engagement I find no mention in Villani. Balbo ( Vita di Dante, vol. ii.
p. 143), refers toGerini, Memorie Storiche di Lunigiana, torn. ii. p. 123, for the
whole history of this Morello or Moroello. Currado Malaspina is introduced
in the eighth Canto of the Purgatory ; where it appears, that although on the
present occasion they espoused contrary sides, most important favours were
nevertheless conferred by that family on our Poet, at a subsequent period of
his exile, in 1307.

3 Ills hands.] Le mani alz6, con ambeduo le fiche.
So Frezzi : E fe le fiche a Dio '1 superbo vermo.

II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. xix.
Io vidi l'ira poi con crudel faccia ;
E fe le fiche a Dio il mostro rio,

Stringendo i denti ed alzando le braccia. Fo. lib. 3. cap. x.
And Trissino : Poi facea con le man le fiche al cielo

Dicendo : Togli, Iddio ; che puoi piu farmi ?

Vital. Liberata, c. xii.
" 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 nations of Europe, and for many ages had been denomi-
nated 'making the fig,' or described at least by some equivalent expression."
Douce's Illustrations of Shakspeare, vol. i. p. 492, ed. 1807. The passage in
the original text has not escaped this diligent commentator.

116 THE VISION. 3-44.

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 ? 1 I did not mark,
Through all the gloomy circles of the abyss,
Spirit, that s weird so proudly 'gainst his God ;
Not him,2 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 3
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 4 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,5 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, befel, that one
Had need to name another. " Where," said he,
* Doth Cianfa 6 lurk 1 " I, for a sign my guide
Should stand attentive, placed against my lips
The finger lifted. If, 0 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

1 Thy seed."] Thy ancestry.

- Xot him.] Capaneus. Canto xiv.

3 On Maremma's marsh.'] An extensive tract near the sea-shore of Tuscany.

4 Cacus.] Virgil. jEn. lib. 8. 193.

5 A hundred blows.] Less than ten blows, out of the hundred Hercules gave
him, had deprived him of feeling.

6 Cianfa.] He is said to have been of the family of Donati at Florence.

46—72. HELL, Canto XXV. 117

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 1

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 2

A dodder'd oak, as round the other's limbs

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,3 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 ! 4 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

1 In either cheek.] Ostendit mihi post hoc apostolus lacuni magnum tetrum,
et aquae sulphureae plenum, in quo animarum multituclo demersa est, plenum
serpentibus ac scorpionibus ; stabant vero ibi et dsemones serpentes tenentes et
ora vultus et capita hominum cum eisdem serpentibus percutientes. A Iberici
Visio, sec. 23.

2 leg 7ie'er clasped.] 'Osro?« xia-o-is $%vh( terns Trfe-S' il-opai.

Euripides, Hecuba, v. 102.

Like ivy to an oak, how will I cling to her !

3 Thus up the shrinking paper.] Many of the commentators suppose that
by " papiro " is here meant the wick of a lamp or candle, and Lombardi ad-
duces an extract from Pier Crescenzio (Agricolt. lib. 6. cap. ix.) to show that
this use was then made of the plant. But Tiraboschi has proved that paper
made of linen came into use towards the latter half of the fourteenth century,
and that the inventor of it was Pier da Fabiano, who carried on his manufactory
in the city of Trevigi ; whereas paper of cotton, with, perhaps, some linen
mixed, was used during the twelfth century. Stor. delta Lett. Ital. torn. v.
lib. 1. cap. iv. sec. 4.

All my bowels crumble up to dust.

I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen
Upon a parchment ; and against this fire
Do I shrink up. Shakspeare, King John, act v. sc. 7.

4 Agnello.] Agnello Brunelleschi.

118 THE VISION. 73—111.

A flash of lightning, if he thwart the road ;

So toward the entrails of the other two

Approaching seemed an adder all on fire,

As the dark pepper-grain livid and swart.

In that part,1 whence our life is nourish'd first,

One 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.2

He eyed the serpent, and the serpent him.

One from the wound, the other from the mouth

Breathed a thick smoke, whose vapoury columns join'd.

Lucan 3 in mute attention now may hear,
Nor thy disastrous fate, Sabellus, tell,
Nor thine, Nasidius. Ovid 4 now be mute.
"What if in warbling fiction he record
Cadmus and Arethusa, to a snake
Him changed, and her into a fountain clear,
I envy not ; for never face to face
Two natures thus transmuted did he sing,
Wherein both shapes were ready to assume
The other's substance. They in mutual guise
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 colour 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.

1 7/i that part.] The navel.

2 As if by sleep or feverous fit assail'd.]

0 Rome ! thy head

Is drown'd in sleep, and all thy body fev'ry. Ben Jonson's Catiline.

3 Lucan.] Phars. lib. 9. 766 and 793.

Lucan di alcun di questi poetando
Conta si come Sabello e Nasidio
Fu punti e trasformati ivi passando.

Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 5. cap. xvii.

4 Ovid.] Metam. lib. 4. and 5.

112—140. HELL, Canto XXV. 119

Nor yet their glaring and malignant lamps

Were shifted, though each feature changed beneath.

Of him who stood erect, the mounting face

Retreated towards the temples, and what there

Superfluous matter came, shot out in ears

From the smooth cheeks ; the rest, not backward dragg'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,1 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 I have done, speed Buoso 2 now ! "

So saw I fluctuate in successive change
The unsteady ballast of the seventh hold :
And here if aught my pen 3 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 : 4 he alone it was
Of the three first that came, who changed not : thou
The other's fate, Gaville ! 5 still dost rue.

1 His sharpen'd visage.'] Compare Milton, P. L. b. 10. 511, etc.

2 Buoso.] He is also said by some to have been of the Donati family ; but
by others of the Abbati.

3 My pen.] Lombardi justly prefers " la penna " to " la lingua ; " but, when
he tells us that the former is in the Nidobeatina, and the latter in the other
editions, he ought to have excepted at least Landino's of 1484, and Vellutello's
of 1544, and, perhaps, many besides these.

4 Sciancato.] Puccio Sciancato, a noted robber, whose family, Venturi says,
he has not been able to discover. The Latin annotator on the Monte Casino
MS. informs us that he was one of the Galigai of Florence, the decline of
which house is mentioned in the Paradise, Canto xvi. 96.

5 Gaville.] Francesco Guercio Cavalcante was killed at Gaville, near
Florence ; and in revenge of his death several inhabitants of that district were
put to death.

120 THE VISION. 1—17.

%

CANTO XXVI.

Remounting by the steps, down which they had descended to the seventh gulf,

they go forward to the arch that stretches over the eighth, aud 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.

Florence, exult ! for thou so mightily
Hast thriven, that o'er land and sea 1 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 honour to thyself redounds.

But if our minds,2 when dreaming near the dawn,
Are of the truth presageful, thou ere long
Shalt feel what Prato 3 (not to say the rest)
Would fain might come upon thee ; and that chance
Were in good time, if it befel thee now.
Would so it were, since it must needs befal !
For as time 4 wears me, I shall grieve the more.

We from the depth departed ; and my guide
Remounting scaled the flinty steps,5 which late
We downward traced, and drew me up the steep.
Pursuing thus our solitary way

1 O'er land and sea.]

For he can spread thy name o'er lands and seas. Milton, Son. viii.

2 But if our minds.]

Namque sub Auroram, jam dormitante lucerna,
Soninia quo cerni tempore vera solent. Ovid, Epist. xix.

The same poetical superstition is alluded to in the Purgatory, Cantos ix. and
xxvii.

3 Shalt feel what Prato.] The Poet prognosticates the calamities which were
soon to befal his native city, and which, he says, even her nearest neighbour,
Prato, 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
multitude were assembled to witness a representation of hell and the infernal
torments, in consequence of which accident many lives were lost ; and a con-
flagration, that in the following month destroyed more than seventeen hundred
houses, many of them sumptuous buildings. See G. Villani, Hist. lib. 8.
cap. lxx. and lxxi.

4 As time.] "I shall feel all calamities more sensibly as I am further
advanced in life."

5 The flinty steps.] Ventura, after Daniello and Volpi, explains the word
in the original, " borni," to mean the stones that project from a wall, for other
buildings to be joined to, which the workmen call "toothings."

18—54. HELL, Canto XXVI. 121

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,1 I reign 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-labour 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 2
The bears avenged, at its departure saw
Elijah's chariot, when the steeds erect
Eaised 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 ardours are the spirits, each
Swath'd 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 3 where lay

1 More than I am wont.'] "When I reflect on the punishment allotted to
those who do not give sincere and upright advice to others, I am more anxious
than ever not to abuse to so bad a purpose those talents, whatever they may
be, which Nature, or rather Providence, has conferred on me." It is probable
that this declaration was the result of real feeling in the mind of Dante, whose
political character would have given great weight to any opinion or party he
had- espoused, and to whom indigence and exile might have offered strong
temptations to deviate from that line of conduct which a strict sense of duty
prescribed.

2 As he, ichose icrongs."] 2 Kings, ii.

3 Asceiiding from that funeral pile.] The flame is said to have divided on
the funeral pile which consumed the bodies of Eteocles and Polynices, as if
conscious of the enmity that actuated thera while living.

122 THE VISION. 55—91.

The Theban brothers." He replied : " Within,

Ulysses there and Diomede endure

Their penal tortures, thus to vengeance now

Together hasting, as ere while to wrath.

These in the flame with ceaseless groans deplore

The ambush of the horse,1 that open'd wide

A portal for that 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,

" 0 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 desire 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,2 might shun discourse with thee."

When there the flame had come, where time and place
Seem'd fitting to my guide, he thus began :
" 0 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 labours 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 3 by her charms,

Ecce iterura fratris primos ut contigit artus
Ignis edax, tremuere rogi, et novus advena busto
Pellitur, exundaut diviso vertice flammae,

Alternosque apices abrupta luce coruscant. Statins, Theb. lib. 12.
Compare Lucan, Pharsal. lib. 1. 145.

1 The ainbush of the horse.'] "The ambush of the wooden horse, that
caused ^Eneas to quit the city of Troy and seek his fortune in Italy, where his
descendants founded the Roman empire."

- For they were Greeks.] By this it is, perhaps, implied that they were
haughty and arrogant. So, in our Poet's twenty-fourth Sonnet, of which a
translation is inserted in the Life prefixed, he says :

Ed ella mi rispose, come un Greco.
3 Caieta.] Virgil, jEneid, lib. 7. L

1)2-123. HELL, Canto XXVI. 123

Ere thus ..-Eneas yet had named the shore ;

Nor fondness for my son,1 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,1 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.

' 0 brothers ! ' I began, ' who to the west

' Through perils without number now have reach'd ;

' To this the short remaining watch, that yet

1 Our senses have to wake, refuse not proof

' Of the unpeopled world, following the track

' Of Phoebus. Call to mind from whence ye sprang :

' Ye were not form'd to live the lives of brutes,

1 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,3 still gaining on the left.

Each star of the other pole night now beheld,4

1 Nor fondness for my son.] Imitated by Tasso, G. L. c. viii. st. 7 :

Ne timor di fatica 6 di periglio, Del vecchio genitor, si clegno affetto

Ne vaghezza del regno, ne pietade Intiepedir nel generoso petto.
This imagined voyage of Ulysses into the Atlantic is alluded to by Pulci :
E sopratutto commendava Ulisse,

Che per veder nell' altro mondo gisse. Morg. Magg. c. xxv.
And by Tasso, G. L. c. xv. 25.

2 The strait pass.] The straits of Gibraltar.

3 Made our oars wings.]

0£3* tvfyi' i^trf/,», tcc « stt6§« vy>vo-i trekovrxi. Hom. Od. 11. 124.

So Chiabrera, Canz. Eroiche, xiii. :

Faro de' remi un volo.
And Tasso, ibid. 26.

4 Night now beheld.] Petrarch is here cited by Lombardi :

Ne la su sopra il cerchio della luna

Vide mai tante stelle alcuna notte. Canz. xxxvii. 1.

Nor there above the circle of the moon

Did ever night behold so many stars.

124 THE VISION. 1^4 — 135.

And ours so low, that from the ocean floor
It rose not. Five times re-illumed, as oft
Yanish'd the light from underneath the moon,
Since the deep way we enter'd, when from far
Appear'd a mountain dim,1 loftiest methought
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 2 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." 3

CANTO XXYII.

Argument.

The Poet, treating of the same punishment as in the last Canto, relates that
he turned towards a flame in which was the Count Guido da Montefeltro,
whose inquiries respecting the state of Romagna he answers ; and Guido
is thereby induced to declare who he is, and why condemned to that
torment.

Now upward rose the flame, and still'd its light
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,4 that rightfully

1 A mountain dim.'] The mountain of Purgatory. Amongst the various
opinions of theologians respecting the situation of the terrestrial paradise,
Pietro Lombardo relates, that " it was separated by a long space, either of sea
or land, 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. 2. dist. 17. Thus Lombardi.

2 Thrice."] Ast ilium ter fluctus ibidem

Torquet agens circum, et rapidus vorat sequore vortex.

Virg. jEn. lib. 1. 116.

3 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 enterprises. Perhaps the story (which it is
not unlikely that our author will be found to have borrowed from some legend
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 explorers of the Atlantic ocean.

4 The Sicilian bull.] The engine of torture invented by Perillus, for the
tyrant Phalaris.

7—38. HELL, Canto XXVII. 125

His cries first echoed who had shaped its mould,

Did so rebellow, with the voice of him

Tormented, 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 :

" 0 thou ! to whom I now direct my voice,

That lately didst exclaim in Lombard phrase,

1 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. If 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 :
" 0 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 stedfast. There Polenta's eagle 2 broods ;

1 Of the mountains there.] Montefeltro.

2 Polenta's eagle.] Guido Novello da Polenta, who bore an eagle for his coat
of arms. The name of Polenta was derived from a castle so called, in the
neighbourhood of Brittonoro. Cervia is a small maritime city, about fifteen
miles to 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 following. This last and most
munificent patron of Dante is himself enumerated, by the historian of Italian
literature, among the poets of his time. Tiraboschi, Storia delta Lett. Ital.
torn. v. lib. 3. c. ii. sec. 13. The passage in the text might have removed
the uncertainty which Tiraboschi expressed respecting the duration of Guido's
absence from Ravenna, when he was driven from that city in 1295, by the arms
of Pietro, archbishop of Monreale. It must evidently have been very short,
since his government is here represented (in 1300) as not having suffered any
material disturbance for many years. In the Proemium to the Annotations on
the Decameron of Boccaccio, written by those who were deputed to that work,
Ediz. Giunti, 1573, it is said of Guido Novello, "del quale si leggono ancora
alcune composizioni. per poche che elle sieno, secondo quella eta, belle e
leggiadre ;" and in the collection edited by Allacci at Naples, 1661, p. 382, is

126 THE VISION. 39-59.

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, 2
That tore Montagna 3 in their wrath, still make,
Where they are wont, an augre of their fangs.

" Lamone's city, and Santerno's, 4 range
Under the lion of the snowy lair, 5
Inconstant partisan, that changeth sides,
Or ever summer yields to winter's frost.
And she, whose flank is wash'd of Savio's wave, 6
As 'twixt the ]evel and the steep she lies,
Lives so 'twixt tyrant power and liberty.

u 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 :
" If I did think my answer were to one
Who ever could return unto the world,

a sonnet of his, which breathes a high and pure spirit of Platouism. Among
the MSS. of the Iliad in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, described by Mai,
there is one that was in the possession of Guido. Iliadis Fragmenta, etc. fol.
Mediol. 1819, Prooemium, p. xlviii. It was, perhaps, seen by Dante. To
this account I must now subjoin that which has since been given, but without
any reference to authorities, by Troya : "In the course of eight years, from
1310 to 1318, Guido III. of Polenta, father of Francesca, together with his sons
Bernardino and Ostasio, had died. A third son, named Bannino, was father of
Guido IV. Of these two it is not known whether they held the lordship of
Ravenna. But it came to the sons of Ostasio, Guido V. called Novello, and
Rinaldo the archbishop : on the sons of Bernardino devolved the sovereignty of
the neighbouring city of Cervia." Veltro Allegorico di Dante, ed. 1826, p. 176.

1 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 defeat with great slaiighter the French army by which it had been be-
sieged. See G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. lxxxi. The Poet informs Guido, its former
ruler, that it is now in the possession of Sinibaldo Ordolaffi, or Ardelafli,
whom he designates by his coat of arras, a lion vert.

2 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 Polenta. See Notes to Canto v. 113.

3 Montagna?] Montagna de' Parcitati, a noble knight, and leader of the
Ghibelline party at Rimini, murdered by Malatestino.

4 Lamone's city and Santerno's.] Lamone is the river at Faenza, and
Santerno at Imola.

5 The lion of the snowy lair.] Machinardo 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 Susinana.

6 Whose flank is ivash'd of Savio's wave.] Cesena, situated at the foot of a
mountain, and washed by the river Savio, that often descends with a swoln
and rapid stream from the Apennine.

60—81. HELL, Canto XXVII. 127

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,2 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.3
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, when each behoves
To lower sails 4 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.
The chief of the new Pharisees 5 meantime,

1 A man of arms.] Guido da Montefeltro.

2 The high priest.] Boniface VIII.

3 The nature of the lion than the fox.] Non furon leonine ma di volpe.
So Pulci, Morg. Magg. c. xix. :

E furon le sue opre e le sue colpe
Non creder leonine ma di volpe.

Fraus quasi vulpeculse, vis leonis videtur. Cicero. Be Officiis, lib. 1. cap. xiii.

4 To loxcer sails.] Our Poet had the same train of thought as when he
wrote that most beautiful passage in his Convito, beginning "E qui e da
sapere, che siccome dice Tullio in quello di Senettute, la naturale morte," etc.,
p. 209. " As it hath been said by Cicero, in his treatise on old age, natural
death is like a port and haven to us after a long voyage ; and even as the
good mariner, when he draws near the port, lowers his sails, and enters it
softly with a weak and inoffensive motion, so ought we to lower the sails of
our worldly operations, and to return to God with all our understanding and
heart, to the end that we may reach this haven with all quietness and with
all peace. And herein we are mightily instructed by nature in a lesson of
mildness ; for in such a death itself there is neither pain nor bitterness ; but,
as ripe fruit is lightly and without violence loosened from its branch, so our
soul without grieving departs from the body in which it hath been."

So mayst thou live, till like ripe fruit thou drop
Into thy mother's lap, or be with ease
Gather'd, not harshly pluck'd, for death mature.

Milton, P. L. b. 11. 537.

5 The chief of the new Pharisees.] Boniface VIII. , whose enmity to the
family of Colonna prompted him to destroy their houses near the Lateran.
Wishing to obtain possession of their other seat, Penestrino, he consulted with
Guido da Montefeltro how he might accomplish his purpose, offering him
at the same time absolution for his past sins, as well as for that which he

128 THE VISION. 82—98.

Waging his warfare near the Lateran,

Not with the Saracens or Jews (his foes

All Christians were, nor against Acre one

Had fought, x nor tramck'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, Constantino besought,2

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,

1 That Penestrino cumber earth no more.

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 accord-
ingly soon afterwards fell into the snare laid for them, A.D. 1298. See G.
Villani, lib. 8. cap. xxiii. There is a relation similar to this in the history of
Ferreto Vincentino, lib. 2. anno 1294 ; and the writer adds, that our Poet
had justly condemned Guido to the torments he has allotted him. See
Muratori, Script. Ital. torn. ix. p. 970, where the Editor observes: "Probosi
hujus facinoris narrationi fidem adjungere nemo probus velit, quod facile
confinxerint Bonifacii aemuli," etc. And indeed it would seem as if Dante
himself had either not heard, or had not believed, the report of Guido's
having sold himself thas foolishly to the Pope, when he wrote the passage
in the Convito cited in the Note to v. 76 ; "for he soon after speaks of him
as one of those noble spirits "who, when they approached the last haven,
lowered the sails of their worldly operations, and gave themselves up to
religion in their old age, laying aside every worldly delight and wish."

1 Nor against Acre one

Had fought.'] He alludes to the renegade Christians, by whom the
Saracens, in April 1291, were assisted to recover St. John d'Acre, the last
possession of the Christians in the Holy Land. The regret expressed by the
Florentine annalist, G. Villani, for the loss of this valuable fortress, is well
worthy of observation, lib. 7. cap. cxliv. " From this event Christendom suf-
fered the greatest detriment : for by the loss of Acre there no longer remained
in the Holy Land any footing for the Christians ; and all our good maritime
places of trade never afterwards derived half the advantage from their mer-
chandise and manufactures ; so favourable was the situation of the city of
Acre, in the very front of our sea, in the middle of Syria, and as it were in
the middle of the inhabited world, seventy miles from Jerusalem, both
source and receptacle of every kind of merchandise, as well from the east as
from the west ; the resort of all people from all countries, and of the eastern
nations of every different tongue ; so that it might be considered as the
aliment of the world."

2 As in Soracte, Constantine besought.] So in Dante's treatise De Monarchic :
"Dicunt quidam adhuc, quod Constantinus Imperator, mundatus a lepra
intercessione Sylvestri, tunc summi pontificis, imperii sedem, scilicet Romam,
donavit ecclesiae, cum multis aliis imperii dignitatibus." Lib. 3. Compare
Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xii.

99—132. HELL, Canto XXVIII. 129

1 Heaven, as thou knowest, I have power to shut
'And open : and the keys are therefore twain,
1 The which my predecessor l meanly prized.'

" Then, yielding to the forceful arguments,
Of silence as more perilous I deem'cl,
And answer'd : ' Father ! since thou washest me
' Clear of that guilt wherein I now must fall,
1 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.
' 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's! 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 fulfill' d his words, the flame
In dolour parted, beating to and fro,
And writhing its sharp horn. We onward went,
I and my leader, up along the rock,
Far as another arch, that overhangs
The foss, wherein the penalty is paid
Of those who load them with committed sin.

CANTO XXVIII.

JUgumcnt.

They arrive in the ninth gulf, where the sowers of scandal, schismatics, and
heretics, are seen with their limbs miserably maimed or divided in differ-
ent ways. Among these the Poet finds Mahomet, Piero da Medicina, Curio,
Mosca, and Bertrand de Born.

Who, e'en in words unfetter 'd, might at full
Tell of the wounds and blood that now I saw,

1 My predecessor.'] Celestine V. See Notes to Canto iii,

I

130 THE VISION. 3—22.

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 l their blood,
Slain by the Trojans,2 and in that long war,3
When of the rings 4 the measured booty made
A pile so high, as Rome's historian writes
Who errs not ; with the multitude, that felt
The griding force of Guiscard's Norman steel,5
And those the rest,6 whose bones are gathered yet
At Ceperano, there where treachery
Branded the Apulian name, or where beyond
Thy walls, O Tagliacozzo,7 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 nought, to the hideous sight
Of the ninth chasm. A rundlet, that hath lost
Its middle or side stave, gapes not so wide

1 Happy soil.] There is a strange discordance here among the expounders.
"Fortunata terra." Because of the vicissitudes of fortune which it experi-
enced : Landino. Fortunate, with respect to those who conquered in it :
Vellutello. Or on account of its natural fertility : Venturi. The context
requires that we should understand by "fortunata," "calamitous," "dis-
graziata," to which sense the word is extended in the Vocabulary of La Crusca :
Lombardi. Volpi is silent. On this note the late Archdeacon Fisher favoured
me with the following remark-: "Volpi is, indeed, silent at the passage ; but
in the article ' Puglia,' in his second Index, he writes, Dante la chiama
fortunata, cioe pingue e feconda. This is your own translation ; and is the same
word in meaning with eiSa/^v and felix, in Xenophon's Anabasis and Horace
passim."

2 The Trojans.'] Some MSS. have "Romani ;" and Lombardi has admitted
it into the text. Venturi had, indeed, before met with the same reading in
some edition, but he has not told us in which.

3 In that long war.] The war of Hannibal in Italy. " When Mago brought
news of his victories to Carthage, in order to make his successes more easily
credited, he commanded the golden rings to be poured out in the senate-
house, which made so large a heap, that, as some relate, they filled three modii
and a half. A more probable account represents them not to have exceeded
one modius" Livy, Hist. lib. 23. xii.

4 The rings.] So Frezzi : Non quella, che riempie i moggi d'anella.

II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. ix.

5 Guiscard's Norman steel.] Robert Guiscard, who conquered the kingdom
of Naples, and died in 1110. G. Villani, lib. 4. cap. xviii. He is introduced
in the Paradise, Canto xviii.

6 And those the rest.] The army of Manfredi, which, through the treachery
of the Apulian troops, was overcome by Charles of Anjou in 1265, and fell in
such numbers, that the bones of the slain were still gathered near Ceperano.
G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. ix. See the Purgatory, Canto iii.

7 0 Tagliacozzo.] He alludes to the victory which Charles gained over Con-
radino, by the sage advice of the Sieur de Valeri, in 1268. G. Villani, lib. 7-
cap. xxvii.

23-53. HELL, Canto XXVIII. 131

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 hare,
And cried, " Now mark how I do rip me : lo !
How is Mohammed mangled : before me
Walks Ali1 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."

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 : 2 bid him, if he wish not

1 Ali.] The disciple of Mohammed.

2 Dolcino .] "In 1305, a friar, called Dolcino, who belonged to no regular
order, contrived to raise in Novara, in Lombardy, a large company of the
meaner sort of people, declaring himself to be a true apostle of Christ, and pro-
mulgating a community of property and of wives, with many other such
heretical doctrines. He blamed the pope, cardinals, and other prelates of the
holy church, for not observing their duty, nor leading the angelic life, and
affirmed that he ought to be pope. He was followed by more than three
thousand men and women, who lived promiscuously on the mountains to
gether, like beasts, and, when they wanted provisions, supplied 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 failure 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." G. Villani, lib. 8.
cap. lxxxiv. Landino observes, that he was possessed of singular eloquence, and
that both he and Margarita endured their fate with a firmness worthy of a
better cause. For a further account of him, see Muratori, Rer. Ital. Scrijrt. torn.
ix. p. 427. Fazio degli Uberti, speaking of the polygamy allowed by Mahomet,
adds :

E qui con fra Dolcin par che s'intenda. Dittamondo, lib. 5. cap. xii.

132 THE VISION. 54—86.

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. " 0 thou ! " said he, " whom sin

Condemns not, and whom erst (unless too near

Resemblance do deceive me) I aloft

Have seen on Latian ground, call thou to mind

Piero of Medicina,1 if again

Returning, thou behold'st the pleasant land 2

That from Vercelli slopes to Mercab6 ;

And there instruct the twain,3 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 4

Shall be cast forth, and whelm'd under the waves

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 6

Offer up vow nor prayer." I answering thus :

1 Medicina.] A place in the territory of Bologna. Piero fomented dissen-
sions among the inhabitants of that city, and among the leaders of the neigh-
bouring states.

2 The pleasant land.] Lombardy.

3 The twain.] Guido del Cassero and Angiolello da Cagnano, two of the
worthiest and most distinguished citizens of Fano, were invited by Malatestino
da Rimini to an entertainment, on pretence that he had some important
business to transact with them ; and, according to instructions given by him,
they were drowned in their passage near Cattolica, between Rimini and
Fano.

4 Out of life's tenement.] " Fuor di lor vasello," is construed by the old
Latin annotator on the Monte Casino MS. and by Lombardi, " out of the ship."
Volpi understands "vasello" to mean "their city or country." Others take
the word in the sense according to which, though not without some doubt, it
is rendered in this translation.

5 Focara's ivind.] Focara is a mountain, from which a wind blows that is
peculiarly dangerous to the navigators of that coast.

87—116. HELL, Cavio XXVIII. 133

w Declare, as thou dost wish that I above

May carry tidings of thee, who is he,

In whom that sight doth wake sucli 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 Caesar's mind,1
Affirming that delay to men prepared
Was ever harmful." Oil ! 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 2 too ; I who, alas ! exclaim'd,
1 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. But I there
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,3 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

1 The doubt in Caesar's mind.'] Curio, whose speech (according to Lucan)
determined Julius Caesar to proceed when he had arrived at Rimini (the
ancient Ariminum), and doubted whether he should prosecute the civil war.

Tolle moras : semper nocuit differre paratis. Pharsal. lib. 1. 281.
Haste then thy towering eagles on their way ;
When fair occasion calls, 'tis fatal to delay. Howe.

2 Mosca."] Buondelmonte was engaged to marry a lady of the Amidei
family, but broke his promise, and united himself to one of the Donati. This
was so much resented by the former, that a meeting of themselves and 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
assassination of Buondelmonte, exclaiming to them, "The thing once done,
there is an end." The counsel and its effects were the source of many terrible
calamities to the state of Florence. "This murder," says G. Villani, lib. 5.
cap. xxxviii., "was the cause and beginning of the accursed Guelph and
Ghibelline parties in Florence." It happened in 1215. See the Paradise.
Canto xvi. 139.

3 The boon companion.]

What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted '{

Shakspeare, 2 Ilcnry VI. act iii. sc. 2.

134 THE VISION. 1 .17-138.

It bore the severed 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,1 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."

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 foi'gers,
who are tormented therein ; hut not being able to discern any thing on
account of the darkness, they descend the rock, that bounds this the last

1 Bertrand.] Bertrand de Born, Vicomte de Hautefort, near Perigueux in
Guienne, who incited John to rebel against his father, Henry II. of England.
Bertrand holds a distinguished place among the Provencal poets. He is quoted
in Dante, De Vulg. ELoq. lib. 2. cap. ii., where it is said, "that he treated of
war, which no Italian poet had yet done." " Arma vero nullum Italum adhuc
poetasse invenio." The triple division of subjects for poetry, made in this
chapter of the De Vulg. Eloj., is very remarkable. It will be found in a Note
on Purgatory, Canto xxvi. 113. For the translation of some extracts from
Bertrand de Bora's poems, see Millot, Hist. Litteraire des Troubadours, torn,
i. p. 210 ; but the historical parts of that work are, I believe, not to be relied
on. Bertrand had a son of the same name, who wrote a poem against John,
king of England. It is that species of composition called the serventese ; and
is in the Vatican, a MS. in Cod. 3204. See Bastero, La Crusca Provenzcde,
Roma, 1724, p. 80. For many particulars respecting both Bertrands, consult
Raynouard's Po'sies des Troubadours; in which excellent work, and in his
Lexique Roman, Paris, 1838, several of their poems, in the Provencal language,
may be seen.

1-38. HELL, Canto XXIX. 135

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.

So 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 1
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."

" If 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
Wert busied with his spirit, who once ruled
The towers of Hautefort, that thou lookedst not
That way, ere he was gone." — " 0 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

1 (r'eri of BelloJ] A kinsman of the Poet's, who was murdered by one of the
Sacchetti family. His being placed here, may be considered as a proof that
Dante was more impartial in the allotment of his punishments than has
generally been supposed. He was the son of Bello, who was brother to Bellin-
cione, our Poet's grandfather. Pelli, Mem. per la Vita di Dante, Opere di
Dante, Zatta ediz. torn. iv. part ii. p. 23.

136 THE VISION. 39— G3.

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,1 if each lazar-house
Of Valdichiana,2 in the sultry time
'Twixt July and September, with the isle
Sardinia and Maremma's pestilent fen,3
Had heap'd their maladies all in one foss
Together ; such was here the torment : dire
The stench, as issuing steams from fester\l 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 iEgina 4 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,
The ancient people were restored anew
From seed of emmets), than was here to see

1 A* were the torment.] It is very probable that these lines gave Milton the
idea of his celebrated description :

Immediately a place
Before their eyes appear'd, sad, noisome, dark.
A lazar-house it seem'd, wherein were laid
Numbers of all diseased, all maladies, etc. P. L. b. 11. -177.

Yet the enumeration of diseases, which follows, appears to have been taken
by Milton from the Qiiadriregio :

Quivi eran zoppi, nionchi, sordi, e orbi,

Quivi era il mal podagrieo e di fianco,

Quivi la frenesia cogli occhi torbi.
Quivi il dolor gridante, e non mai stanco,

Quivi il catarro con la gran cianfarda,

L'asma, la polmonia quivi eran' anco.
L'idropisia quivi era grave e tarda,

Di tutte febbri quel piano era pieno,

Quivi quel mal, che par che la carne arda. Lib. 2. cap. viii.

2 Of Valdichiana.] The valley through which passes the river Chiana,
bounded by Arezzo, Cortona, Montepulciauo, and Chiusi. In the heat of
autumn it was formerly rendered unwholesome by the stagnation of the water,
but has since been drained by the Emperor Leopold II. The Chiana is
mentioned as a remarkably sluggish stream, in the Paradise, Canto xiii. 21,

3 Maremma's pestilent fen.] See Note to Canto xxv. v. 18.

4 In jEgina.] He alludes to the fable of the ants changed into Mvrmidons.
Ovid, Met. lib. 7.

64—108. HELL, Canto XXIX. 137

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 in 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 1 " 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,
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 ;

1 Arezzo wets my dwelling.'] Grifolino of Arezzo, who promised Albero,
son of the Bishop of Sienna, that lie would teach him the art of flying ; and,
because he did not keep his promise, Albero prevailed on his father to have
him burnt for a necromancer.

138 THE VISION. 109—129.

And lie, admiring much, as lie 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 Daedalus,
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 1 1 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 2 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,3 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 4 show'd

1 Was ever race

Light as S enna's ?] The same imputation is agaiu cast on the Siennese,
Purg. Canto xiii. 141.

2 Stricca.] This is said ironically. Stricca, Niccolo Salimbeni, Caccia of
Asciano, and Abbagliato or Meo de' Folcacchieri, belonged to a company of
prodigal and luxurious young men in Sienna, called the " brigata godereccia."
Niccolo was the inventor of a new manner of using cloves in cookery, not very
well understood by the commentators, and which was termed the " costuma
ricca." Pagliarini, in his Historical Observations on the Quadriregio, lib. 3.
cap. xiii., adduces a passage from a MS. History of Sienna, in which it is told
that these spendthrifts, out of the sum raised from the sale of their estates,
built a palace, which they inhabited in common, and made the receptacle of
their apparatus for luxurious enjoyment ; and that, amongst their other
extravagancies, they had their horses shod with silver, and forbade their
servants to pick up the precious shoes if they dropped off. The end was, as
might be expected, extreme poverty and wretchedness. Landino says, they
spent two hundred thousand florins in twenty months. Horses shod with
silver are mentioned by Fazio degli Uberti :

Ancora in questo tempo si fu visto
Quel Roberto Guiscardo, che d'argento
I cavagli ferro per far l'acquisto.
Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xxiv. as corrected by Perticari.

3 In that garden.] Sienna.

4 Abbagliato.'] Lombardi understands "Abbagliato" not to be the name of
a man, but to be the epithet to "senno," and construes "E l'abbagliato suo
senno proferse," " and manifested to the world the blindness of their under-
standing." So little doubt, however, is made of there being such a person,
that Allacci speaks of his grandfather Folcacchiero de' Folcacchieri of Sienna,
as one who may dispute with the Sicilians the praise of being the first inventor
of Italian poetry. Tiraboschi, indeed, observes, that this genealogy is not
authenticated by Allacci ; yet it is difficult to suppose that he should have
mentioned it at all, if Meo de' Folcacchieri, or Abbagliato, as he was called,
had never existed. Vol. i. p. 95, Mr. Mathias's edit.

130—138. HELL, Canto XXX. 139

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,1
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.

What 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,2

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,3 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,4

A wretch forlorn and captive, when she saw

Polyxena first slaughter'd, and her son,

1 Capocchio's ghost. ] Capocchio of Sienna, who is said to have been a
fellow-student of Dante's, in natural philosophy.

2 Athamas.] From Ovid, Metam. lib. 4: Protinus iEolides, etc.

3 With her other burden."]

Seque super pontum nullo tardata timore

Mittit, onusque suum. Ovid, Metam. lib. 4.

4 Hecuba.'] See Euripides, Hecuba; and Ovid, Metam. lib. 13.

140 THE VISION. 19—58.

Her Poly dor us,1 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

Excluded from his stye. One reach'd Capocchio,

And in the neck-joint sticking deep his fangs,

Draggtt 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 ; 2 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," 3 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 towards the chin, the other upward curl'd.

" 0 ye ! who in this world of misery,
Wherefore I know not, are exempt from pain,"

1 Her Polydorus.]

Aspicit ejectum Polidori in littore corpus. Ovid, Mctam. lib. 13.

2 Schicchi.~\ Gianni Schicchi, who was of the family of Cavalcanti, pos-
sessed such a faculty of moulding his features to the resemblance of others,
that he was employed by Simon Donati to personate Buoso Donati, then
recently deceased, and to make a will, leaving Simon his heir ; for which
service he was remunerated with a mare of extraordinary value, here called
"the lady of the herd."

3 Myrrha.'] See Ovid, Metam. lib. 10.

59—88. HELL, Canto XXX. 141

Thus he began, "attentively regard
Adamo's woe.1 When living, full supply-
Ne'er lack'd me of what most I coveted ;
One drop of water now, alas ! I crave.
The rills, that glitter down the grassy slopes
Of Casentino,2 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 labouring sighs.
There is Eomena, 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 3 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 4
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." 5

1 Adamo's woe.] Adamo of Brescia, at the instigation of Gnido, Alessandro,
and their brother Aghinnlfo, 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.

2 Casentino.'] Romena is a part of Casentino.

3 Branda's limpid spring.'] A fountain in Sienna.

4 Less.] Lombardi justly concludes that as Adamo wishes to exaggerate the
difficulty of finding the spirit whom he wished to see, " men," and not " phi"
(" less," and not "more " than the half of a mile), is probably the true read-
ing ; for there are authorities for both.

5 The florens with three carats of alloy.] The floren was a coin that ought to
have had twenty-four carats of pure gold. Villani relates, that it was first
used at Florence in 1252, an era of great prosperity in the annals of the Re-
public ; before which time their most valuable coinage was of silver. Hist.
lib. 6. cap. liv. Fazio degli Uberti uses the word to denote the purest gold :

Pura era come l'oro del fiorino. Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xiv.
"Among the ruins of Chaucer's house at Woodstock they found an ancient
coin of Florence ; I think, a Florein, anciently common in England. Chaucer,
Pardon. Tale, v. 2290.

For that the Floraines been so fair and bright.

142 THE VISION. 89-132.

"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,'"'
Heanswer'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 x of the Hebrew youth ;
Sinon the other, that false Greek from Troy.
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 true :
But there thou gavest not such true testimony,
When thou wast question'd of the truth, at Troy."

" If 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 thy 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 towards him turn'd

Edward the Third, in 1344, altered it from a lower value to 6s. 8d. The
particular piece I have mentioned seems about that value." Warton, Hist, of
Eng. Poetry, vol. ii. sec. 2. p. 44.
1 The false accuser.'] Potiphar's wife.

133—145. HELL, Canto XXXI. 143

With shame so poignant, as reinember'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,
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.

Argument.

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 con-
taining as many sorts of Traitors ; hut the present Canto shows only that
the circle is encompassed with Giants, one of whom, Antajus, takes them
both in his arms and places them at the bottom of the circle.

The very tongue,1 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.

1 The very tongue.']

Vulnus;in Herculeo quse quondam fecerat hoste
Vidneris auxilium Pelias hasta fuit. Ovid, Rem. Amor. 47.

The same allusion was made by Bernard de Ventadour, a Provencal poet
in the middle of the twelfth century ; and Millot observes, that "it was a
singular instance of erudition in a Troubadour." But it is not impossible, as
Warton remarks {Hist, of Engl. Poetry, vol. ii. sec. 10. p. 215), but that he
might have been indebted for it to some of the early romances. In Chaucer's
Squier's Tale, a sword of similar quality is introduced :

And other folk have wondred on the sweard,
That could so piercen through every thing ;
And fell in speech of Telephus the king,
And of Achilles for his queint spere,
For he couth with it both heale and dere.

So Shakspeare, 2 Henry VI., act v. sc. 1 :

Whose smile and frown like to Achilles' spear
Is able with the change to kill and cure.

144 THE VISION. 6-45.

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 J 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
Is this 1 " 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 farther 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 2 crowns his walls ;
E'en thus the shore, encompassing the abyss,
Was turreted with giants,3 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

1 Orlando.] When Charlemain with all his peerage fell

At Fontarabia. Milton, P. L.b.1. 586.

See Warton's Hist, of Eng. Poetry, vol. i. sec. 3. p. 132. " This is the
horn which Orlando won from the giant Jatmund, and which, as Turpin and
the Islandic bards report, was endued with magical power, and might be
heard at the distance of twenty miles." Charlemain and Orlando are intro-
duced in the Paradise, Canto xviii.

2 Montereggion.'] A castle near Sienna.

3 Giants.] The giants round the pit, it is remarked by Warton, are in the
Arabian vein of fabling. See D'Herbelot, Bibl. Orientate, V. Rocail, p. 717, a.

46— 82. HELL, Canto XXXI. 145

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

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 2 bai ameth, sabl alml : "

So snouted his fierce lips, which sweeter hymns

Became not ; and my guide address'd him thus :

" 0 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 ! 3 lo, on thy mighty breast

Where hangs the baldrick ! " Then to me he spake :

" He doth accuse himself. Nimrod is this,

Through whose ill counsel in the world no more

One tongue prevails. But pass Ave 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. I cannot say
What master hand had girt 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

1 TJie pine.] "The large pine of bronze, which once ornamented the top
of the mole of Adrian, was afterwards employed to decorate the top of the
belfry of St. Peter ; and having (according to Buti) been thrown clown by
lightning, it was, after lying some time on the steps of this palace, transferred
to the place where it now is, in the Pope's garden, by the side of the great
corridore of Belvedere. In the time of our Poet, the pine was then either on
the belfry or on the steps of St. Peter." Lombardi.

2 Raphel, etc.] These unmeaning sounds, it is supposed, are meant to ex-
press the confusion of languages at the building of the tower of Babel.

3 Spirit con/used.] I had before translated "Wild spirit!" and have
altered it at the suggestion of Mr. Darley, who well observes that "anima
confusa " is peculiarly appropriate to Nimrod, the author of the confusion at
Babel.

146 THE VISION. 83-123.

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 lie never." Forthwith I return'd :

" Fain would I, if 't were possible, mine eyes,

Of Briareus immeasurable, gain'd

Experience next." He answer'd : " Thou shalt see

Not far from hence Anta)us, 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 Antoeus, who, five ells complete

Without the head, forth issued from the cave.

" 0 thou, who in the fortunate vale,1 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 2 whilom felt

1 The fortunate vale.] The country near Carthage. See Liv. Hist. lib. 30.,
and Lucan, Phars. lib. 4. 590, etc. Dante has kept the latter of these writers
in his eye throughout all this passage.

2 Alcides.'] The combat between Hercules and Antaeus is adduced by the
poet in his treatise Be Monarchic, lib. 2., as a proof of the judgment of
God displayed in the duel, according to the singular superstition of those
times. " Certamine vero dupliciter Dei judicium aperitur vel ex collisione
virium, sicut fit per duellum pugilum, qui duelliones etiam vocantur ; vel ex

124— 13G. HELL, Canto XXXII. 147

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,1 from beneath
Where it doth lean, if chance a passing cloud
So sail across, that opposite it hangs ;
Such then Antseus seem'd, as at mine ease
I mark'd him stooping. I were fain at times
To have past another way. Yet in the abyss,
That Lucifer with Judas low ingulfs,
Lightly he placed us ; nor, there leaning, stayed ;
But rose, as in a bark the stately mast.

CANTO XXXII.

Jtrjjtttiunt.

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 Cai'na, Dante finds Camiccione de' Pazzi, who gives him an account
of other sinners who are there punished ; and in the next, named Ante-
nora, he hears in like manner from Bocca degli Abbati who his fellow-
sufferers are.

Could 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 emprize

To jest with, and demands a tongue not used

To infant babbling.2 But let them assist

My song, the tuneful maidens, by whose aid

Amphion wall'd in Thebes ; so with the truth

coutentione plurium ad aliquod signum prsevalere conantium, sicut fit per
pugnam athletarum currentium ad bravium. Primus istorum modorum apud
gentiles figuratus fuit in illo duello Herculis et Antaei, cujus Lucanus meminit
in quarto Pharsaliae, et Ovidius in nono de rerum transmutatione. "

1 The tower of Carisenda.'] The leaning tower at Bologna.

2 A tongue not used

To infant babbling.] Ne da lingua, che chiami mamma, o babbo.

Dante in his treatise De Vtdg. Moq., speaking of words not admissible in
the loftier, or, as he calls it, tragic style of poetry, says — " In quorum numero
nee puerilia propter suam simplicitatem ut Mamma et Babbo," lib. 2. cap. vii.

148 THE VISION. 12-43

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 sj>eak 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,

And saw before and underneath my feet

A lake,1 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. Roll'd o'er that mass

Had Tabernich or Pietrapana 2 fallen,

Not e'en its rim had creak'd. As peejos the frog

Croaking above the wave, what time in dreams

The village gleaner oft pursues her toil,

So, to where modest shame appears,3 thus low

Blue pinch'd and shrined in ice the spirits stood,

Moving their teeth in shrill note like the stork.4

His face each downward held ; their mouth the cold,

Their eyes express'd the dolour 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. " Tell me ye,
Whose bosoms thus together press," said I,
" Who are ye 1 " At that sound their necks they bent ;
And when their looks were lifted up to me,

1 .1 lake.] The same torment is introduced into the Edda, compiled in the
eleventh and twelfth centuries. See the " Song of the Sun," translated by the
Rev. James Beresford, London, 1805 ; and compare Warton's Hist, of Eng.
Poetry, vol. i. dissert. 1., and Gray's Posthumous Works, edited by Mr. Mathias,
vol. ii. p. 106. Indeed, as an escape from "the penalty of Adam, the season's
difference," forms one of the most natural topics of consolation for the loss of
life, so does a renewal of that suffering in its fiercest extremes of heat and
cold bring before the imagination of men in general (except indeed the terrors '
of a self-accusing conscience) the liveliest idea of future punishment. Refer to
Shakspeare and Milton in the Notes to Canto hi. 82 ; and see Douce's Illustra-
tions of Shakspeare, 8vo, 1807, vol. i. p. 182.

2 Tabernich or Pietrapana.] The one a mountain in Sclavonia, the other in
that tract of country called the Garfagnana, not far from Lucca.

3 To where modest shame appears.] " As high as to the face."

4 Moving their teeth in shrill note like the stork.]

Mettendo i denti in nota di cicogna.

So Boccaccio, G. viii. N. 7 : " Lo scolar cattivello quasi cicogna divenuto si
forte batteva i denti."

44—72. HELL, Canto XXXII. 149

Straightway their eyes, before all moist within,
DistilM 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,
They clash'd together : them such fury seized.

And one, from whom the cold both ears had reft,
Exclaim'd, still looking downward : " Why on us
Dost speculate so long ? If thou wouldst know
Who are these two,1 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
Cai'na thou mayst search, nor find a shade
More worthy in congealment to be fix'd ;
Not him,2 whose breast and shadow Arthur's hand
At that one blow dissever'd ; not Focaccia ; 3
No, not this spirit, whose o'er jutting head
Obstructs my onward view : he bore the name
Of Mascheroni : 4 Tuscan if thou be,
Well knowest who he was. And to cut short
All further question, in my form behold
What once was Camiccione.5 I await
Carlino 6 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

1 Who are these two.] Alessandro and Napoleone, sons of Alberto Alberti,
who murdered each other. They were proprietors of the valley of Falterona,
where the Bisenzio has its source, a river that falls into the Arno about six
miles from Florence.

2 Not him.'] Mordrec, son of King Arthur. In the romance of Lancelot of
the Lake, Arthur, having discovered the traitorous intentions of his son, pierces
him through with the stroke of his 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.

3 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. See G. Villani, Hist. lib. 8. cap. xxxvii.
and Macchiavelli, Hist. lib. 2. The account of the latter writer differs much
from that given by Landino in his Commentary.

4 Mascheroni.] Sassol Mascheroni, a Florentine, who also murdered his
uncle.

5 Camiccione.] Camiccione de' Pazzi of Valdarno, by whom his kinsman
Ubertino was treacherously put to death.

0 Carlino.] One of the same family. He betrayed the Castel di Piano
Travigne, in Valdarno, to the Florentines, after the refugees of the Bianca and
Ghibelline party had defended it against a siege for twenty-nine days, in the
summer of 1302. See G. Villani, lib. 8. cap. lii. and Dino Compagni, lib. 2.

150 THE VISION. 73—111.

Toward the middle, at whose point unites
All heavy substance, and I trembling went
Through that eternal chilness, I know not
If will x 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,2 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. " What art thou, speak,
That railest thus on others 1 " He replied :
" Now who art thou, that smiting others' cheeks,
Through Antenora 3 roamest, with such force
As were past sufferance, wert thou living still 1 "

" 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 enrol."

" The contrary of what I covet most,"
Said he, " thou tender'st : hence ! nor vex me more.
Ill knowest thou to natter 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 1 " — " 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,

1 If will.'] Whether upheld by strength, or chance, or fate.

Milton, P. L. b. 1. 133.

2 Montaperto."] The defeat of the Guelfi at Montaperto, occasioned by the
treachery of Bocca degli Abbati, who, during the engagement, cut off the hand
of Giaeopo del Vacca de' Pazzi, bearer of the Florentine standard. G. Villani,
lib. 6. cap. lxxx. and Notes to Canto x. This event happened in 1260.

3 Antenora.] " So called from Antenor, who, according to Dictys Cretensis
{De Bello Troj. lib. 5.) and Dares Phrygius {De Excidio Trojce) betrayed Troy
his country." Lombardi. See note on Purg. Canto v. 75. Antenor acts this
part in Boccaccio's Filostrato, and in Chaucer's Troihis and Creseide.

112—136. HELL, Canto XXXII 151

Forget not : here he wails the Frenchman's gold.
'Him of Duera,'1 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,2 whose red gorge distain'd
The biting axe of Florence. Farther on,
If I misdeem not, Soldanieri 3 bides,
With Ganellon,4 and Tribaldello,5 him
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 c gnaw'd,
Than on that skull and on its garbage he.

" 0 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 colour of his sinning was,
I may repay thee in the world above,
If that, wherewith I speak, be moist so long."

1 Him of Duera. Buoso of Cremona, 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.D. 1265, at which the people of Cremona were so enraged,
that they extirpated the whole family. G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. iv.

2 Beccaria.] Abbot of Vallombrosa, who was the Pope's legate at Florence,
where his intrigues in favour of the Ghibellines being discovered, he was
beheaded. I do not find the occurrence in Villani, nor do the commentators
say to what Pope he was legate. By Landino he is reported to have been from
Parma ; by Vellutello, from Pavia.

3 Soldanieri.] "Gianni Soldanieri," says Villani, Hist. lib. 7. cap. 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.D. 1266.

4 Ganellon.] The betrayer of Charlemain, mentioned by Archbishop Tnrpin.
He is a common instance of treachery with the poets of the Middle Ages.

Trop son fol e mal pensant,

Pis Valent que Guenelon. Thibaut, Hoi de Navarre.

0 new Scariot and new Ganilion,

0 false dissembler, etc. Chaucer, Nonne's Prieste's Tale.

And in the Morike's Tale, Peter of Spaine.

5 Tribaldello.] Tribaldello de' Manfredi, who was bribed to betray the city
of Faenza, A.D. 1282. G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. lxxx.

6 Tydeus.] See Statins, Then. lib. 8. ad fincm.

152 THE VISION. 1—14.

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 kindness ; and among these he finds the Friar
Alberigo de' Manfredi, who tells him of one whose soul was already tor-
mented in that place, though his body appeared still to be alive upon the
earth, being yielded up to the governance of a fiend.

His 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 :

But Florentine thou seemest of a truth,

When I do hear thee. Know, I was on earth

Count Ugolino,1 and the Archbishop he

1 Count Ugolino.] " In the year 1288, in the month of July, Pisa was much
divided by competitors for the sovereignty ; 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 Ruggieri degli Ubaldini, with the Lanfranchi,
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 contrived 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 himself, retired to Calci, his castle, and
formed an alliance with the Florentines and people of Lucca against the Pisans.
The Count, before Nino was gone, in order to cover his treachery, when every-
thing was settled for his expulsion, 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 honour. But his
greatness was not of long continuance. It pleased the Almighty 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 da Capraia, his
sister's son, on account of the envy and fear excited in his mind by the high
esteem in which the gracious manners of Anselmo were held by the Pisans. —
The power of the Guelfi being so much diminished, the Archbishop devised

15—40. HELL, Canto XXXIII. 153

Ruggieri. Why I neighbour him so close,

Now list. That through effect of his ill thoughts

at is,
rate

dps,

mly attacked

>d by telling

the citizens

render ; his

i sons, with

i. cap. cxx.

nt Ugolino,

his son the

tower to be

from them.

3S declared

him. All

rred ; and

shall ever

ical effect,

di Dante,

le writer

ave been

itroduced

try. See

, instead
10 would
i of the

liucca.

152 THE VISION. 1—14.

CA^TO YYYTTT

The Poet is told by
which he and L
of the Archbi
called Ptolom(
under the sen.
Alberigo de' M
mented in tha
earth, being y

His jaws
That sin
Which h
" Thy w
Sorrow '
My hea.
That I )
Fruit oi
The tra
Shalt s<
I know
But Fl.
When
Count

1 Count Ugo
divided by con
the Guelfi, bei'
consisting of o
and a third by
Sismondi, Gu
effect his purr
trayed Nino, '
either be driv
not seeing ar
formed an all
The Count, b
thing was se*
his called Se
he returned .
supreme po-v
greatness wp
reverse of fc
guilt ; for h
sister's son,
esteem in w.
The power

}

15-40. HELL, Canto XXXIII. 153

Ruggieri. Why I neighbour him 60 close,
Now list. 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 l
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 2 which forbids the sight
Of Lucca to the Pisan. With lean brachs
Inquisitive and keen, before him ranged
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 ?

means to betray the Count Ugolino, and caused him to be suddenly attacked
in his palace 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 citizens
of Florence and of Lucca. He was immediately compelled to surrender ; his
bastard son and his grandson fell in the assault ; and two of his sons, with
their two sons also, were conveyed to prison." G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. cxx.
" 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 thenceforward the tower was called the tower of famine, and so shall ever
be." Ibid. cap. cxxvii. Troya asserts that Dante, for the sake of poetical effect,
has much misrepresented the real facts. See his Veltro Allegorico di Dante,
ed. 1826, p. 28, 9. This would render a conjecture, which the same writer
elsewhere hazards, still more improbable ; that the story might have been
written by Dante when the facts were yet recent, and afterwards introduced
into his poem. Ibid. p. 96. Chaucer has briefly told Ugolino's story. See
Monke's Tale, Hugeline of Pise.

1 Several moons.] Many editions, and the greater part of the MSS., instead
of "piu lune," read "piu lume ;" according to which reading Ugolino would
say, that the day had broke, and shone through the grated window of the
prison, before he fell asleep.

2 Unto the mountain.'] The mountain S. Giuliano between Pisa and Lucca.

154 THE VISION. 41—78.

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.1
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

1 Far less, if thou wouldst eat of us : thou gavest 2

* 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
c For me, my father ! ' There he died ; and e'en
Plainly as thou seest me, saw I the three
Fall one by one 'twist the fifth day and sixth :
Whence I betook me, now grown blind, to grope
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. Oh, thou Pisa ! shame
Of all the people, who their dwelling make

1 All stone 1 felt within.] " My heart is turn'd to stone ; I strike it. and it
hurts my hand." Shakspeare, Othello, act iv. sc. 1.

2 Thou gavest.] Tu ne vestisti

Queste misere carni, e tu le spoglia.

Imitated by Filicaja, Canz. iii. :

Pi questa Imperial caduca spoglia
Tu, Signor, me vestisti e tu mi spoglia :
Ben puoi '1 Regno me tor tu ehe me '1 desti.

And by Maflfei in the Merope :

Tu disciogleste
Queste misere membra e tu le annodi.

79- -116. HELL, Canto XXXIII. 155

In that fair region,1 where the Italian voice

Is heard ; since that thy neighbours are so slack

To punish, from their deep foundations rise

Capraia and Gorgona,2 and dam up

The mouth of A mo ; 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 ; 3
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 1 Is not here below
All vapour 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 :
" 0 souls ! so cruel, that the farthest post
Hath been assign'd you, from this face remove
The hardend veil ; that I may vent the grief
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," 4 answer'd he,

1 In that fair region.] Del bel paese la, dove '1 si suona.

Italy, as explained by Dante himself, in his treatise Be Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1.
cap. yiii. : " Qui autem Si dicunt a praedictis finibus (Januensium) Orientalem
(Meridioualis Europe partem) tenent ; videlicet usque ad promontorium illud
Italiae, qua sinus Adriatici maris incipit et Siciliam."

2 Capraia and Gorgona.'] Small islands near the mouth of the Arno.

3 There, very weeping suffers not to tveep.]

Lo pianto stesso li pianger non lascia.
So Giusto de' Conti, Bella Mano. Son. " Quanto il ciel : "

Che il troppo pianto a me pianger non lassa.

4 The friar Alberigo.] Alberigo de' Manfredi of Faenza, one of the Frati
Godenti, Joyous Friars, who, having quarrelled with some of his brotherhood,

156 THE VISION. 117—140.

"Am I, who from the evil garden pluck'd

Its fruitage, and am here repaid, the date l

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,

" I am right ignorant. Such privilege

Hath Ptolomea,2 that oft-times the soul 3

Drops hither, ere by Atropos divorced.

And that thou mayst wipe out more willingly

The glazed tear-drops 4 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 past away,

Since to this fastness Branca Doria 5 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,6 and putteth raiment on."

under pretence of wishing to be reconciled, invited them to a banquet, at the
conclusion of which he called for the fruit, a signal for the assassins to rush
in and dispatch those whom he had marked for destruction. Hence, adds
Landino, it is said proverbially of one who has been stabbed, that be has had
some of the friar Alberigo's fruit. Thus Pulci, Morg. Magg. c. xxv. :

Le frutte amare di frate Alberico.

1 The date.] Come Dio rende dataro per fico.

Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 4. cap. xix.

2 Ptolomea."] This circle is named Ptolomea from Ptolemy the son of
Abubus, 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, king of
Egypt, the betrayer of Pompey the Great.

3 The soul.] Chaucer seems to allude to this in the Frere's Tale, where a
fiend assumes the person of a yeoman, and tells the Sompnour that he shall
one day come to a place where he shall understand the mystery of such
possessions,

Bet than Virgile, while he was on live,
Or Dant also.
See Mr. Southey's Tale of Donica.

4 The glazed tear-drops.] sorrow's eye, glazed with blinding tears.

Shakspeare, Rich. II. act ii. sc. 2.

5 Branca Doria.] The family of Doria was possessed of great influence in
Genoa. Branca is said to have murdered his father-in-law, Michel Zanche,
introduced in Canto xxii.

6 Eats, drinks, and sleeps.] But 'tis a spirit.

Pro. No, wench, it eats and sleeps, and hath such senses
As we have, such. Shakspeare, Tempest, act i. sc. 2.

141—155. HELL, Canto XXXIV. 157

He thus : " Not yet unto that upper foss
By th' evil talons guarded, where the pitch
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 wrought. But now put forth
Thy hand, and ope mine eyes." I oped them not.
Ill manners were best courtesy to him.

Ah Genoese ! men perverse in every 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 x 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.

gkgttmtttt.

In the fourth aud last round of the ninth circle, those who have betrayed
their benefactors are wholly covered with ice. And in the midst is
Lucifer, at whose back Dante and Virgil ascend, till by a secret path they
reach the surface of the other hemisphere of the earth, and once more
obtain sight of the stars.

" The banners 2 of Hell's Monarch do come forth
Toward us ; therefore look," so spake my guide,
" If thou discern him." As, when breathes a cloud
Heavy and dense, or when the shades of night
Fall on our hemisphere, seems viewed from far
A windmill,3 which the blast stirs briskly round ;
Such was the fabric then methought I saw.

To shield me from the wind, forthwith I drew
Behind my guide : 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 ;

1 Romagna's darkest spirit.] The friar Alberigo.

1 The banners.] Vexilla regis prodeunt inferni.

A parody of the first verse in a hymn that was sung by the church in praise of
the cross.

3 A windmill.] The author of the Caliph Vathek, in the notes to that tale,
justly observes that it in more than probable that Don Quixote's mistake of
the windmills for giants was suggested to Cervantes by this simile.

158 THE VISION. 14—38.

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,
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.
I was not dead nor living.1 Think thyself,
If quick conception work in 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,2 than the giants are his arms.
Mark now how great that whole must be, which suits
With such a part. If he were beautiful
As he is hideous now, and yet did dare
To scowl upon his Maker, well from him
May all our misery flow. Oh what a sight !
How passing strange it seem'd, when I did spy
Upon his head three faces : 3 one in front
Of hue vermilion, the other two with this

1 / was not dead nor living.]

out Iv rot? ifOiuivoi;,

out' tv Z,u<rtv i,gi6/xou/xivri.

Euripides, Supplices, v. 979, Markland's edit.

turn ibi me nescio quis arripit

Timidam atque pavidam, nee vivam nee mortuam.

Plautus, Curculio, act v. so. 2.
- A giant.'] Nel primo clima sta come signore

Colli giganti ; ed un delle sue braccie
Pin che nullo di loro e assai maggiore.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. i.

3 Three faces.] It can scarcely be doubted, but that Milton derived his
description of Satan, in those lines :

Eacb passion dinim'd his face

Thrice changed with pale ire, envy, and despair. P. L. b. 4. 111.

from this passage, coupled with the remark of Vellutello upon it : " The lirst
of these sins is anger, which he signifies by the red face ; the second, repre-
sented by that between pale and yellow, is envy, and not, as others have said,
avarice ; and the third, denoted by the black, is a melancholy humour that causes
a man's thoughts to be dark and evil, and averse from all joy and tranquillity."
Lombardi would understand the three faces to signify the three parts of the
world then known, in all of which Lucifer had his subjects : the red denoting
the Europeans, who were in the middle ; the yellow, the Asiatics, on the right ;
and the black, the Africans, who were on the left ; according to the position of
the faces themselves.

39—56 HELL, Canto XXXIV. 159

Midway each shoulder join'd and at the crest ;
The right 'tvvixt -wan and yellow seeni'd ; the left
To look on, such as come from whence old Kile
Stoops to the lowlands. Under each shot forth
Two mighty wings, enormous as became
A bird so vast. Sails l never such I saw
Outstretch'd on the wide sea. No plumes had they,
But were in texture like a bat ; 2 and these
He flapp'd i5 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 distill'd with bloody foam.
At every mouth his teeth a sinner champ'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 oft-times the back
Was stript of all its skin. " That upper spirit,

1 Sails.] Aigo non ebbe mai si grande vela,

Ne altra nave, come l'ali sue ;
Ne mai tessuta fu si grande tela.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. xix.

His sail-broad vans

He spreads for flight. Milton, P. L. b. 2. 927.

Compare Spenser, F. Q. b. 1. c. xi. st. 10 ; Ben Jonson's Every Man out of
his Humour, v. 7 ; and Fletcher's Prophetess, act ii. scene 3. In his descrip-
tion of Satan, Frezzi has departed not less from Dante than our own poet has
done ; for he has painted him on a high throne, with a benignant and glad
countenance, yet full of majesty, a triple crown on his head, six shining wings
on his shoulders, and a court thronged with giants, centaurs, and mighty-
captains, besides youths and damsels, who are disporting in the neighbouring
meadows with song and dance ; but no sooner does Minerva, who is the
author's conductress, present her crystal shield, than all this triumph and
jollity is seen through it transformed into loathsomeness and horror. There
are many touches in this picture that will remind the reader of Milton.

2 Like a bat.] The description of an imaginary being, who is called
Typhurgo, in the Zodiacus Vitai, has something very like this of Dante's

Lucifer :

Ingentem vidi regem, ingentique sedentem
In solio, crines flammanti stemmate cinctum,

utrinque patentes

Alee humeris magnse, quales vespertilionum

Membranis contextse amplis —

Nudus erat longis sed opertus corpora villis.

M. Palingenii, Zod. Vit. lib. 9

A mighty king I might discerne,

Placed hie on lofty chaire,
His haire with fyry garland deckt

Puft up in fiendish wise.

Large wings on him did grow
Framde like the wings of flinder mice, etc. Googe's Translation.

160 THE VISION. 57—86.

Who liath worst punishment," so spake my guide,
" Is Judas, he that hath his head within
And plies the feet without. Of th' other two,
Whose heads are under, from the murky jaw
Who hangs, is Brutus : x lo ! how he doth writhe
And speaks not. The other, Cassius, that appears
So large of limb. But night now re-ascends ;
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 the 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.

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
put a lawful monarch to death. Yet if Caesar was such, the conspirators might
be regarded as deserving of their doom. " 0 uomini eccellenti ! " exclaims
the commentator, with a spirit becoming one who felt that he lived in a free
state, "ed al tutto degni a quali Roma fosse patria, e de' quali restera sempre
eterna memoria ; legginsi tutte le leggi di qualunque republica bene instituta,
e troveremo che a nessuno si propose maggior premio che a chi uccide il
tiranno." Cowley, as conspicuous for his loyalty as for his genius, in an ode
inscribed with the name of this patriot, which, though not free from the usual
faults of the poet, is yet a noble one, has placed his character in the right point
of view —

Excellent Brutus ! of all human race

The best, till nature was improved by grace.

If Dante, however, believed Brutus to have been actuated by evil motives in
putting Caesar to death, the excellence of the patriot's character in other
respects would only have aggravated his guilt in that particular. "Totius
autem injustitiae nulla capitalior est quam eorum, qui cum maxime fallunt id
agunt, ut viri boni esse videantur." Cic. De Off. lib. 1. cap. xiii.

87— Uo. HELL, Canto XXXIV. 161

"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 l
The sun returns." It was no palace-hall
Lofty and luminous wherein we stood,
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 boretli through the world.
Thou wast on the other side, so long as I
Descended ; when I turn'd, thou didst o'erpass
That point,2 to which from every part is dragg'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,3
That sprang aloof." There is a place beneath,
From Belzebub as distant, as extends
The vaulted tomb ; 4 discover'd not by sight,
But by the sound of brooklet, that descends
This way along the hollow of a rock,

1 Within one hour and half of noon.] The Poet uses the Hebrew manner
of computing the day, according to which the third hour answers to our
twelve o'clock at noon.

2 That point.] Monti observes, that if this passage had chanced to meet the
eye of Newton, it might better have awakened his thought to conceive the
system of attraction, than the accidental falling of an apple. Proposta, v. iii.
pte 2. p. lxxviii. 8°. 1824.

3 By what of firm land on this side appears.] The mountain of Purgatory.

4 The vaulted tomb.] "La tomba." This word is used to express the whole
depth of the infernal region.

L

162 THE VISION. 126—133.

Which, as it winds with no precipitous course,
The wave hath eaten. By that hidden way
My guide and I did enter, to return
To the fair world : and heedless of repose
We climb'd, he first, I following his steps,
Till on our view the beautiful lights of heaven
Dawn'd through a circular opening in the cave :
Thence issuing we again beheld the stars.

THE VISION OF DANTE.
Purgatorg.

163

THE VISION OF DANTE.

$urgatorg*

CANTO I.

«3lnjmiunt.

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 proceed on their way through Purgatory, dis-
appears ; and the two poets go towards the shore, where Virgil cleanses
Dante's face with the dew, and girds him with a reed, as Cato had com-
manded.

O'er better waves 1 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 second region will I sing,
In which the human spirit from sinful blot
Is purged, and for ascent to Heaven prepares.

Here, 0 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 2
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,

1 O'er better waves.] So Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 2. c. i. :
Per correr maggior acqua alza le vele,
0 debil navicella del mio ingegno.
- Birds of chattering note.] For the fable of the daughters of Pierus. who
challenged the Muses to sing, and were by them changed into magpies, see
Ovid, Met. lib. 5. fab. 5.

165

166 THE VISION 15—31.

High up as the first circle,1 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.
The radiant planet,2 that to love invites,
Made all the orient laugh,3 and veil'd beneath
The Pisces' light,4 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 stars 5 ne'er seen before save by the ken
Of our first parents.6 Heaven of their rays
Seem'd joyous. 0 thou northern site ! bereft
Indeed, and widow'd, since of these deprived.

As from this view I had desisted, straight
Turning a little towards the other pole,
There from whence now the wain 7 had disappear'd,
I saw an old man 8 standing by my side

1 The first circle.'] Either, as some suppose, the moon ; or, as Lombardi
(who likes to be as far off the rest of the commentators as possible) will have
it, the highest circle of the stars.

2 Planet.] Venus.

3 Made all the orient laugh.] Hence Chaucer, Knight's Tale :

And all the orisont laugheth of the sight.
It is sometimes read " orient."

* The Pisces' light.] The constellation of the Fish veiled by the more
luminous body of Venus, then a morning star.

5 Four stars.] Venturi observes that " Dante here speaks as a poet, and
almost in the spirit of prophecy ; or, what is more likely, describes the heaven
about that pole according to his own invention. In our days," he adds, " the
cross, composed of four stars, three of the second and one of the third magni-
tude, serves as a guide to those who sail from Europe to the south ; but in the
age of Dante these discoveries had not been made : " yet it appears probable,
that either from long tradition, or from the relation of later voyagers, the real
truth might not have been unknown to our Poet. Seneca's prediction of the
discovery of America may be accounted for in a similar manner. But what-
ever may be thought of this, it is certain that the four stars are here symbolical
of the four cardinal virtues, Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance.
See Canto xxxi. v. 105. M. Artaud mentions a globe constructed by an
Arabian in Egypt, with the date of the year 622 of the Hegira, corresponding
to 1225 of our era, in which the southern cross is positively marked. See his
Histoire de Dante, ch. xxxi. and xl. 8°. Par. 1841.

6 Our first parents.] In the terrestrial paradise, placed, as we shall see, by
our Poet, on the summit of Purgatory.

7 The wain.] Charles's Wain, or Bootes.

8 An old man.] Cato.

Secretosque pios ; his dantem jura Catonem. Virg. jEn. 8. 670.
The commentators, and Lombardi amongst the rest, might have saved them-
selves and their readers much needless trouble if they would have consulted
the prose writings of Dante with more diligence. In the Convito, p. 211, he
has himself declared his opinion of the illustrious Boman : " Quale uomo," etc.
"What earthly man was more worthy to follow God than Cato? Certainly
none." And again, p. 212: " Nel nome di cui," etc. "In whose name,
whatever needs be said concerning the signs of nobility may be concluded ;
for, in l.im, that nobility displays them all throughout all ages."

32—62. PURGATORY, Canto I. 1G7

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 lied % "
He spoke and moved those venerable plumes.1
" 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 2
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 farthest gloom ; 3
But erring by his folly had approach'd
So near, that little space was left to turn.
Then, as before I told, I was dispatch'd
To work his rescue ; and no way remain'd

1 Venerable plumes.] Insperata tuse quum veniet pluma superbiae.

Hor. Carm. lib. 4. ode 10.
The same metaphor has occurred in Hell, Canto xx. v. 41 :

the plumes,

That mark'd the better sex.

It is used by Ford in the Lady's Trial, act iv. sc. 2 :

Now the down

Of softness is exchanged for plumes of age.

2 A Dame from heaven.'] Beatrice. See Hell, ii. 54.

3 The farthest gloam.] L'ultima sera.
So Ariosto, 0. F. Canto xxxiv. st. 59 :

Che non han visto ancor l'ultima sera.

And Filicaja, Canto ix., Al Sonno :

L'ultima sera.

And Mr. Mathias, Canzone a Guglielmo Roscoe premessa alia Storia dclla
Poesia Italiana, p. 13 :

Di morte non vedra l'ultima sera.

168 THE VISION. 63—93.

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.

For us the eternal edicts are unmoved :

He breathes, and I of Minos am not bound,1

Abiding in that circle, where the eyes

Of thy chaste Marcia 2 beam, who still in look

Prays thee, 0 hallow'd spirit ! to own her thine.

Then by her love we implore thee, let us pass

Through thy seven regions ; 3 for which, best thanks

I for thy favour 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,4
Which was ordain'd me, when I issued thence.
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.

1 Of Minos am not bound.] See Hell, v. 4.

2 Marcia."] Da foedera prisci

Illibata tori : da tantum nomen inane

Connubii : liceat tumulo scripsisse, Catonis

Martia. Lncan, Phars. lib. 2. 344.

Our author's habit of putting an allegorical interpretation on everything, a
habit which appears to have descended to that age from certain fathers of the
church, is nowhere more apparent than in his explanation of this passage.
See Convito, p. 211 : " Marzia fa vergine," etc. " Marcia was a virgin, and in
that state she signifies childhood ; then she came to Cato, and in that state
she represents youth ; she then bare children, by whom are represented the
virtues that we have said belong to that age." Dante would surely have done
well to remember his own rule laid down in the De Monarch, lib. 3 : " Adver-
tendum," etc. " Concerning the mystical sense it must be observed that we
may err in two ways, either by seeing it where it is not, or by taking it other-
wise than it ought to be taken."

3 Through thy seven regions.] The seven rounds of Purgatory, in which
the seven capital sins are punished.

4 By that law.] When he was delivered by Christ from limbo, a change of
affections accompanied his change of place.

94—131. PURGATORY, Canto I. 169

Go therefore now : and with a slender reed 1
See that thon 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 seemty 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 2
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.3

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 apprized,
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.

Then on the solitary shore arrived,
That never sailing on its waters saw
Man that could after measure back his course,

1 A slender reed.] The reed is here supposed, with sufficient probability,
to be meant for a type of simplicity and patience.

I Where to take.] " Prendere il monte," a reading which Lombardi claims
for his favourite Nidobeatina edition, is also found in Landino'.s of 1484.

3 I spied the trembling of the ocean stream.]

Conobbi il tremolar della marina.
So Trissino in the So/onisba :

E resta in tremolar l'onda marina.
And Fortiguerra, Ricciardetto, Canto ix. st. 17 :

visto il tremolar della marina.

170 THE VISION. 132—136.

He girt me in such manner as had pleased
Him who instructed ; and 0 strange to tell !
As he selected every humble plant,
Wherever one was pluck'd, another x there
Eesembling, 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,
Dante recognises his friend Casella ; but, while they are entertained by
him with a song, they hear Cato exclaiming against their negligent loiter-
ing, and at that rebuke hasten forwards to the mountain.

Now had the sun 2 to that horizon reach'd,
That covers, with the most exalted point
Of its meridian circle, Salem's walls ;
And night, that opposite to him her orb
Rounds, from the stream of Ganges issued forth,
Holding the scales,3 that from her hands are dropt
"When she reigns highest : 4 so that where I was,
Aurora's white and vermeil-tinctured cheek
To orange turn'd 5 as she in age increased.

Meanwhile we linger'd by the water's brink,
Like men,6 who, musing on their road, in thought
Journey, while motionless the body rests.

1 Another.] From Virg. jEn. lib. 6. 143. Primo avulso non deficit alter.

2 Now had the su)i.] 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. See Routh's Reli-
quiae Sacrce, torn. iii. p. 256. So Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 6.
cap. vi.:

questo monte e quello

Ch' in mezzo il mondo apunto si divisa.

3 The scales.] The constellation Libra.

* When she reigns highest.] "Quando soverchia" is (according to Venturi,
whom I have followed) "when the autumnal equinox is passed." Lombardi
supposes it to mean "when the nights begin to increase, that is, after the
summer solstice."

5 To orange turn'd.] " L' aurora gia di vermiglia cominciava appressandosi
il sole a divenir rancia." Boccaccio, Decam. G. iii. at the beginning. See
Notes to Hell, xxiii. 101.

6 Like nien.] Che va col cuore e col corpo dimora.
So Frezzi :

E mentre il corpo posa, col cor varca.

II Qxvadrir. lib. 4. cap. viii.

13-50. PURGATORY, Canto II. 171

When lo ! as, near upon the hour of dawn,

Through the thick vapours l Mars with fiery beam

Glares down in 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.

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 what 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 nought ;

So that nor oar he needs, nor other sail

Except his wings,2 between such distant shores.

Lo ! how straight up to heaven he holds them rear'd,

Winnowing the air 8 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 splendour 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 4 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,

1 Through the thick vapours.] So in the Convito, p. 72: "Esso pare,"
etc. "He (Mars) appears more or less inflamed with heat, according to
the thickness or rarity of the vapours that follow him."

2 Except his wings.] Hence Milton :

Who after came from earth, sailing arrived

Wafted by angels. P. L. b. 3. ver. 521.

3 Winnowing the air.]

Trattando l'aere con l'eterne penne.
So Filicaja, Canz. viii. st. 11 :

Ma trattar l'aere coll' eterne piume.
* In Exitu.] " When Israel came out of Egypt." Ps. cxiv.

172 THE VISION. 51—77.

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 x 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."

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 brings, 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 ardour 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

1 With his arrowy radiance.] So Milton :

and now went forth the morn :

from before her vanish'd night,

Shot through with orient beams. P. L. b. 6. ver. 15.

This has been regarded by some critics as a conceit, into which Milton was
betrayed by the Italian poets ; but it is in truth authorized by one of the
correctest of the Grecians :

' Ov a-ioXot yt£ ivctfiZofAivx

tixtu, xotrivvetZu re, pXey/J^iavev

"AXiev. Sophocles, Trachin. 96.

Ecco diuanzi a te fugge repente
Saettata la uotte. Marini, Son. al Sig. Cinthio Aldobrandino.

2 Thrice my hands.]

Ter conatus ibi collo dare brachia circum,

Ter frustra comprensa manus effugit imago ;

Par levibus ventis volucrique simillima somno.

Virg. jSn. 2. 794.
Compare Homer, Od. 11. 205.

The incident in the text is pleasantly alluded to in that delightful book, the
Capricci del Botaio of Gelli (Opere, Milan, 1805, vol. ii. p. 26), of which there
is an English translation, ""titled "The Fearfull Fancies of the Florentine
Cooper. Written in Toscane, by John Baptist Gelli, one of the free studie of
Florence. And for recreation translated into English by W. Barker." 8vo.
Lond. 1599.

78—100. PURGATORY, Canto 11. 173

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,1 where I am,2
Journeying this way ; " I said : " but how of thee
Hath so much time been lost ? " 3 He answer'd straight :

" No outrage hath been done to me, if he,4
Who when and whom he chooses takes, hath oft
Denied me passage here ; since of just will
His will he makes. These three months past5 indeed,
He, whoso chose to enter, with free leave
Hath taken ; whence I wandering by the shore 6
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."

1 My Casella.'] A Florentine, celebrated for his skill in music, "in whose
company," says Landino, "Dante often recreated his spirits, wearied by
severer studies." See Dr. Burney's History of Music, vol. ii. cap. iv. p. 322.
Milton has a fine allusion to this meeting in his sonnet to Henry Lawes :

Dante shall give fame leave to set thee higher
Than his Casella, whom he wooed to sing,
Met in the milder shades of Purgatory.

2 Where I am.] " La dove io son." Lombardi understands this differently:
" Not without purpose to return again to the earth, where I am ; that is,
where I usually dwell."

3 Hath so much time been lost.] There is some uncertainty in this passage.
If we read

Ma a te com' era tanta terra tolta ?

with the Nidobeatina and Aldine editions, and many MSS., it signifies "why
art thou deprived of so desirable a region as that of Purgatory ? why dost
thou not hasten to be cleansed of thy sins ? " If with the Academicians della
Crusca, we read,

Diss 'io, ma a te come tant' ora e tolta ?

which is not destitute of authority to support it, and which has the advantage
over the other, as it marks Dante's speech from Casella's, then it must mean
as I have translated it, "why hast thou lost so much time in arriving here?"
Lombardi, who is for the former reading, supposes Casella to be just dead ;
those, who prefer the latter, suppose him to have been dead some years, but
now only just arrived.

4 He.] The conducting angel.

5 These three months past.] Since the time of the Jubilee, during which all
spirits not condemned to eternal punishment were supposed to pass over to
Purgatory as soon as they pleased.

8 The shore.] Ostia.

174 THE VISION. 101-126.

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,
Traveling so far, of pain is overcome."

" Love, that discourses in my thoughts,"1 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 nought else 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
Accii3tom'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 2 who goes, yet, where he tends, knows not.

Nor with less hurried step did we depart

CANTO III.

Argument.

Our Poet, perceiving no shadow except that cast by his own body, is fearful
that Virgil has deserted him ; but he is freed from that error, and both
arrive together at the foot of the mountain : on finding it too steep to
climb, they inquire the way from a troop of spirits that are coming towards
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.

Them sudden flight had scatter'd o'er the plain,
Turn'd towards the mountain, whither reason's voice

1 " Love, that discourses in my tlwughts."]

" Amor che nella mente mi ragiona."
The first verse of a canzone in the Convito of Dante, which he again cites in
his treatise De Vulg. Eloq. lib. 2. cap. vi.

2 As one.~\ Com' uom, che va, ne sa clove riesca.
So Frezzi :

Come chi va. ne sa dove camina. II Quadrir. lib. 1. ca.p. iii.

3— 3b. PURGATORY, Canto III. 175

Drives us : I, to my 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 Litter pang of self-remorse,

Seem'd smitten. 0 clear conscience, and upright !

How doth a little failing wound thee sore.1

Soon as his feet desisted (slackening pace)
From haste, that mars all decency of act,2
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 3 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 1
It now is evening there, where buried lies
The body in which I cast a shade, removed
To Naples 4 from Brundusium's wall. Nor thou
Marvel, if before me no shadow fall,
More than that in the skyey element
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,

1 Hoxu doth a little failing wound thee sore."]

Ch' era al cor picciol fallo amaro morso. Tasso, G. L. Canto x. st. 59.

2 Haste, that mars all decency of act."] Aristotle in his Physiog. cap. iii. reckons
it among the &v*/Sou? trr^uet, " the signs of an impudent man," that he is iv T«7f
xivf.o-ariv i%v?, " quick in his motions." Compare Sophocles, Electra, 878 :

To XOtr/J. ov fx-tBtitrot,.

Joy, my dear sister, wings my quick return,

And with more speed than decency allows. Potter.

3 Where highest.] Lombardi proposes, with some hesitation, a different
meaning from that which has hitherto been affixed to the words,

Che 'nverso '1 ciel pm alto si dislaga ;

and would construe them, " that raises itself higher than every other mountain
above the sea : " " sopra l'allagamento delle acque del mare." The conjecture
is at least ingenious, and has obtained new force by the arguments of Monti in
his Proposta.

4 To Naples.] Virgil died at Brundusium, from whence his body is said to
have been removed to Naples.

176 THE VISION. 34- G6.

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 ; l
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
Downwards his forehead, and in troubled mood 2
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 Tarbia,3 were to this
A ladder easy and open of access.

" Who knows on which hand now the steep declines ? "
My master said, and paused ; u so that he may
Ascend, who journeys without aid of wing?"
And while, with looks directed to the ground,
The meaning of the pathway 4 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,

1 Desiring fruitlessly.] See Hell, Canto iv. 39.

2 In troubled mood.] Because he himself (Virgil) was amongst the number
of spirits, who thus desired without hope.

3 'Twixt Lerice and Turbia.] At that time the two extremities of the
Genoese republic ; the former on the east, the latter on the west. A very in-
genious writer has had occasion, for a different purpose, to mention one of these
places as remarkably secluded by its mountainous situation. " On an eminence
among the mountains, between the two little cities, Nice and Monaco, is the
village of Torbia, a name formed from the Greek t§<kt«/«." Mitforol on the
Harmony of Language, sec. 15, p. 351, 2d edit.

* The meaning of the pathioay.] Lombardi reads,

tenea '1 viso basso,

Esaminando del cammin la mente,

and explains it, "he bent down his face, his mind being occupied with con-
sidering their way to ascend the mountain." I doubt much whether the words
can bear that construction.

67—107. PURGATORY, Caxto III. 177

(When we some thousand steps,1 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.

" 0 spirits perfect ! 0 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,2 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 towards him turn'd, and with fix'd eye beheld.
Comely and fair, and gentle of aspect
He seem'd, but on one brow a gash was mark'd.

When humbly I disclaim'd to have beheld

1 When toe some thousand steps.] Mr. Carlyle puts a query to my former
translation of this passage. It was certainly erroneous.

* As sheep.] The imitative nature of these animals supplies our Poet with
another comparison, in his Convito, p. 34 : " Questi sono da chiamare pecore,"
etc. "These may he called flocks of sheep and not men ; for if one sheep
should throw himself down a precipice of a thousand feet, all the rest would
follow ; and if one for any cause in passing a road should leap, all the rest
would do the same, though they saw nothing to leap over."

M

178 THE VISION. 108—125.

Him ever : " Now behold ! " lie said, and show'd
High on his breast a wound : then smiling spake.

" I am Manfredi,1 grandson to the Queen
Costanza : 2 whence I pray thee, when return'd,
To my fair daughter 3 go, the parent glad
Of Aragonia and Sicilia's pride ;
And of the truth inform her, 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 4 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,

1 Manfredi.] Kiug of Naples and Sicily, and the natural son of Frederick
II. He was lively and agreeable in his manners, and delighted in poetry,
music, and dancing. But he was luxurious and ambitious, void of religion,
and in his philosophy an Epicurean. See G. Villain, lib. 6. cap. xlvii. and
Mr. Mathias's Tiraboschi, vol. i. p. 99. 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, exact as he generally is,
might not have thought it necessary to distinguish them in point of time ; for
this seems the best method of reconciling some little apparent inconsistency
between him and the annalist. "Dying excommunicated, King Charles did
not allow of his being buried in sacred ground, but he was interred 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 afterwards, 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 Church ;
and that it was buried by the river Verde, on the borders of the kingdom and
of Campagna. This, however, we do not affirm." G. Villani, Hist. lib. 7.
cap. ix. Manfredi and his father are spoken of by our Poet in his De VuJg.
Eloj. lib. 1. cap. xii. with singular commendation. " Siquidem illustres," etc.
"Those illustrious worthies, Frederick the Emperor, and his well-born son
Manfredi, manifested their nobility and uprightness of form, as long as fortune
remained, by following pursuits worthy of* men, and disdained those which are
suited only to brutes. Such, therefore, as were of a lofty spirit, and graced
with natural endowments, endeavoured to walk in the track which the majesty
of such great princes had marked out for them : so that whatever was in their
time attempted by eminent Italians, first made its appearance in the court of
crowned sovereigns ; and because Sicily was a royal throne, it came to pass
that whatever was produced in the vernacular tongue by our predecessors was
called Sicilian ; which neither we nor our posterity shall be able to change."

2 Costanza.'] See Paradise, Canto iii. 121.

3 My fair daughter.] Costanza, the daughter of Manfredi, and wife of
Peter III. King of Arragon, by whom she was mother to Frederick, King of
Sicily, and James, King of Arragon. With the latter of these she was at
Rome 1296. See G. Villani, lib. 8. cap. xviii. and Notes to Canto vii.

4 Clement.] Pope Clement IV.

126—141. PURGATORY, Canto IV. 179

And the wind drives, out of the kingdom's bounds,

Far as the stream of Verde,1 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 hope2

Retains her verdant blossom. True it is,

That such one as in contumacy dies

Against the holy church, though he repent,

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.

^Vraumtnt.

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 themselves, and turning to the east,
Dante wonders at seeing the sun on their left, the cause of which is ex-
plained 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 amongst 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 ac-
count of his having delayed his repentance to the last.

"When 3 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 ;

1 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.

Passa la mora di Manfre, cui lava

II Verde.

Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 3. cap. i. as corrected by Pertieari.

2 Hope.'] Mentre che la speranza ha fior del verde.

So Tasso, G. L. Canto xix. st. 53 : infin che verde h fior di speme.

3 When.] It must be owned the beginning of this Canto is somewhat
obscure. Vellutello refers, for an elucidation of it, to the reasoning of Sta-
tius in the twenty-fifth Canto. Perhaps some illustration may be derived
from the following passage in the Summa Theologies of Thomas Aquinas :
"Some say that in addition to the vegetable soul, which was present from
the first, there supervenes another soul, which is the sensitive, and again,

180 THE VISION. 5—27.

And thus the error is disproved, which holds
The soul not singly lighted in the breast.
And therefore whenas aught is heard or seen,
That firmly keeps the soul toward it turn'd,
Time passes, and a man perceives it not.
For that, whereby we hearken, is 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 l aloft
The sun had measured, unobserved of me,
When we arrived where all with one accord
The spirits shouted, " Here is what ye ask."

A larger aperture oft-times 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 2 road
Who journe3rs, or to Noli 3 low descends,
Or mounts Bismantua's 4 height, must use his feet ;
But here a man had need to fly, I mean
With the swift wing 5 and plumes of high desire,

iu addition to that, another, which is the intellective. And so there are in
man three souls, one of which exists potentially with regard to another : but
this has been already disproved. And accordingly others say that that same
soul, which at first was merely vegetative, is, through action of the seminal
virtue, carried forward till it reaches to that point, in which, being still the
same, it nevertheless becomes sensitive ; and at length the same by an ul-
terior progression is led on till it becomes intellective ; not, indeed, through
the seminal virtue acting in it, but by virtue of a superior agent, that is,
God, enlightening it from without," (This opinion he next proceeds to
confute.) "Dicunt ergo quidam qu6d supra animam vegetabilem, qua;
primo inerat, supervenit alia anima, quae est sensitiva, supra illam iterum
alia quae est intellectiva. Et sic sunt in homine tres animae, quarum una
est in potentia ad aliam, quod supra improbatum est. Et ideo alii dicunt,
quod ilia eadem anima, quae primo fuit vegetativa tantum, postmodum per
actionem virtutis, quae est in semine, perducitur ad hoc, ut ipsa eadem fiat
sensitiva ; et tandem ipsa eadem perducitur ad hoc, ut ipsa eadem fiat in-
tellectiva, non quidem per virtutem activam seminis, sed per virtutem supe-
rioris agentis, scilicet Dei deforis illustrantis." Thorn. Aguin. Opera, Edit.
Venet. 1595, torn. x. Summa Theolog. lma Pars, Quaestio cxviii. Art. ii.
See also Lettere di Fra Guitlone, 4to, Roma, 1745, p. 15 ; and Routh's Note
on the Gorgias of Plato, p. 451.

1 Full fifty steps.] Three hours and twenty minutes, fifteen degrees being
reckoned to an hour.

2 Sanleo.] A fortress on the summit of Montefeltro. The situation is
described by Troya, Veltro Allegorico, p. 11. It is a conspicuous object to
travellers along the cornice on the riviera di Genoa.

3 Noli.] In the Genoese territory, between Finale and Savona.

4 Bismantua.] A steep mountain in the territory of Reggio.

5 With the swift wing, j Compare Paradise, Canto xxxiii. 17.

28-G1. PURGATORY, Canto IV. 181

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,
" 0 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 x
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,
Then raised them to the sun, and wondering mark'd
That from the left 2 it smote us. Soon perceived
That poet sage, how at the car of light
Amazed 3 I stood, where 'twixt us and the north
Its course it enter'd. Whence he thus to me :
i Were Leda's offspring 4 now in company
Of that broad mirror, that high up and low
Imparts his light beneath, thou mightst behold

1 More than line.'] It was much nearer to being perpendicular than horizontal.
- From the left.] Vellutello observes an imitation of Lucan in this passage :

Ignotum vobis, Arabes, venistis in orbem,

Umbras mirati nemorum non ire sinistras. Phars. lib. 3. 248.

3 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 towards the east ; not recol-
lecting that he was now antipodal to Europe, from whence he had seen the
sun taking an opposite course.

4 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 portion 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 understood that portion of the Zodiac affected or
made red by the sun ; for the whole of the Zodiac never changes, nor appears
to change, with respect to the remainder of the heavens." Lombardi.

182 THE VISION. 62—100.

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, and two hemispheres apart,

Where lies the path * that Phaeton ill knew

To guide his erring chariot : thou wilt see 2

How of necessity by this, on one,

Pie 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 3
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 towards the warmer part.
But if it please thee, I would gladly know,
How far we have to journey : for the hill
Mounts higher, than this sight of mine can mount."

He thus to me : " Such is this steep ascent,
That it is ever difficult at first,
But more a man proceeds, less evil grows.4
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.
Their 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
Not he before was ware. Thither we drew ;
And there were some, who in the shady place

1 The path.] The ecliptic.

2 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 eminences."

3 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) recedes from this mountain towards the
north, at the time when the Jews inhabiting Mount Sion saw it depart to-
wards the south." Lombardi.

4 But more a man proceeds, less evil grows.] Because in ascending he gets
rid of the weight of his sins.

101—135. PUKGATORY, Canto IV. 183

Behind the rock were standing, as a man
Through idleness might stand. Among thorn 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
Were 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,1 now for thee I grieve no more.
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,2 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." 3

1 Belacqua.] Concerning this man, the commentators afford no information,
except that in the margin of the Monte Casino MS. there is found this brief,
notice of him : "Iste Belacqua fuit optimus magister cithararum, et leutorum,
et pigrissimus homo in operibus mundi sicut in operibus aninue." "This
Belacqua was an excellent master of the harp and lute, but very negligent in
his affairs both spiritual and temporal." Lettera di Eustazio Dicearcheo ad
Angelio Sidicino, 4to, Roma, 1801.

2 The bird of God.] Here are two other readings, "Uscier" and "Angel,"
" Usher " and "Angel " of God.

3 Marocco's shore. ] Cuopre la notte gia col pie Marocco. Hence, perhaps,
Milton :

Damasco or Marocco or Trebisond. P. L. b. 1. 584.

instead of Morocco, as he elsewhere calls it :

Morocco and Algiers and Tremisen. P. L. b. 11. 404.
If the vowels were to change places, the verse would in both instances be
spoiled.

184 THE VISION. 1—27.

CANTO V.

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 amongst these, Giacopo del Cassero, Buonconte
da Montefeltro, and Pia, a lady of Sienna.

Now 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 l of him beneath,2 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

Imports it thee, what thing is whisper'd here ?

Come after me, and to their babblings leave

The crowd. Be as a tower,3 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 nought the other's strength."

What other could I answer, save " I come " ?
I said it, somewhat with that colour tinged,
Which oft-times 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 ;

1 It seems as if the light not shone

From the left hand.] The sun was, therefore, on the right of our travellers.
For, as before, when seated and looking to the east from whence they had
ascended, the sun was on their left ; so now that they have risen and are again
going forward, it must be on the opposite side of them.

2 Of him beneath.] Of Dante, who was following Virgil up the mountain,
and therefore was the lower of the two.

3 Be as a tower.] Sta come torre ferma.
So Berni, Orl. Inn. lib. 1. canto xvi. st. 48 :

In quei due piedi sta fermo il gigante
Com' una torre in mezzo d'un castello.
And Milton, P. L. b. 1. 591:

Stood like a tower.

28— Go. PURGATORY, Canto V. 185

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 honour : they may prize him well."

Ne'er saw I fiery vapours 1 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 in 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."

" 0 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 2
Thou mayst report. Ah, wherefore go'st thou on ?
Ah, wherefoie tarriest thou not? We all
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.

1 Ne'er saw I fiery vapours.] Imitated by Tasso, G. L. canto xix. st. 62:

Tal suol fendendo liquido sereno
Stella cader della gran madre in seno.

And by Milton, P. L. b. 4. 558 :

Swift as a shooting star

In autumn thwarts the night, when vapours fired
Impress the air.

Compare Statius, Theb. 1. 92:

Ilicet igne Jovis, lapsisque citatior astris.
- There.] Upon the earth.

l8fm THE VISION. G6— 1>5.

Whence I, who sole before the others speak,

Entreat thee, if thou ever see that land *

Which lies between Komagna 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 earned But the deep passages,

Whence issued out the blood 3 wherein I dwelt,

Upon my bosom in An tenor's land 4

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 towards 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 : " Ah ! so may the wish,
That takes thee o'er the mountain, be fulfill'd,
As thou shalt graciously give aid to mine.
Of Montefeltro I ; 5 Buonconte I :
Giovanna 6 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 1 "

" Oh ! " answer'd he, " at Casentino's foot
A stream there courseth, named Archiano, sprung
In Apennine above the hermit's seat.7
E'en where its name is cancel'd,8 there came I,

1 That land.] The Marca d'Ancona, between Romagna and Apulia, the
kingdom of Charles of Anjou.

2 From thence I came.] Giacopo del Cassero, a citizen of Fano, who having
spoken ill of Azzo da Este, Marquis of Ferrara, 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 towards Mira, higher up on that river, instead of
making for the marsh on the sea-shore, he might have escaped.

3 The blood.] Supposed to be the seat of life.

4 Antenor's land.] The city of Padua, said to be founded by Antenor.
This implies a reflection on the Paduans. See Hell, xxxii. 89. Thus G.
Villain calls the Venetians " the perfidious descendants from the blood of
Autenor, the betrayer of his country, Troy." Lib. 11. cap. Ixxxix.

5 Of Montefeltro I.] Buonconte (son of Guido da Montefeltro, whom we
have had in the twenty-seventh Canto of Hell) fell in the battle of Campaldino
(1289), fighting on the side of the Aretini. In this engagement our Poet took
a distinguished part, as we have seen related in his Life. See Fazio degli
Uberti, Dittaviondo, lib. 2. cap. xxix.

6 Giovanna.] Either the wife, or a kinswoman of Buonconte.

7 The hermit's seat.] The hermitage of Camalcloli.

8 Where its name is cancel d] That is, between Bibbiena and Poppi, where
the Archiano falls into the Arno.

9G— 130. PURGATORY, Canto V. J 87

Pierced in the throat,1 fleeing away on foot,

And bloodying the plain. Here sight and speech

Fail'd me ; and, finishing with Mary's name,

I fell, and tenantless my flesh remain'd.

I will report the trnth ; which thou again

Tell to the living. Me God's angel took,2

Whilst he of hell exclaim'd : 'O thou from heaven !

' Say wherefore hast thou robb'd me 1 Thou of him

' The" eternal portion bear'st with thee away,

1 For one poor tear 3 that he deprives me of.

' But of the other, other rule I make.'

" Thou know'st how in the atmosphere collects
That vapour dank, returning into water
Soon as it mounts where cold condenses it.
That evil will,4 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 ; 6
And stretch'd the sky above ; so that the air
Impregnate changed to water. Fell the rain ;
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 nought stay'd its course. My stiffen'd frame,
Laid at his mouth, the fell Archiano found,
And dash'd 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.

1 Throat.'] In the former editions it was printed "heart." Mr. Carlyle has
observed the error.

2 Me God's angel took.] Cum autem finem vitae explesset servus Dei aspiciens
vidit diabolum simul et Angelum ad animam stantem ac unum quemque illam
sibi tollere festinantem. Alberici Visio, sec. 18.

3 For one poor tear.] Visum est quod angelus Domini lachrimas quas dives
ille fuderat in ampulla teneret. Alberici Visio, sec. 18.

4 That evil will.] The devil. Lombardi refers us to Albertus Magnus, Be
Potentid Dcemonum. 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 Testament.

8 From Pratomagno to the mountain range.] From Pratomagno, now called
Prato Vecchio, (which divides the Valdarno from Casentino,) as far as to the
A pen nine.

188 THE VISION. 131—133.

I once was Pia.1 Sienna gave me life ;
Maremma took it from me. That he knows,
Who me with jewel'cl ring had first espoused."

CANTO VI.

^rfiumcnt.

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, Avhen 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. Afterwards he meets
with Sordello the Mantuan, whose affection, shown to Virgil his country-
man, leads Dante to break forth into an invective against the unnatural
divisions with which Italy, and more especially Florence, was distracted.

When from their game of dice men separate,
He who hath lost remains in sadness fix'd,
Eevolving in his mind 2 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
Is stretch'd, well knows he bids him stand aside ;
And thus 3 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.

1 Pia.] She is said to have been a Siennese lady, of the family of Tolommei,
secretly made away with by her husband, Nello della Pietra, of the same city,
in Maremma, where he had some possessions.

2 Revolving in his mind.] Eiman dolente

Ripetendo le volte, e triste impara.

Lombardi explains this : "that the loser remains by himself, and taking up
the dice casts them over again, as if to learn how he may throw the numbers
he could wish to come up." There is something very natural in this ; but
whether the sense cau be fairly deduced from the words, is another question.

3 And thus] The late Archdeacon Fisher pointed out to me a passage in the
Novela de la Gitanilla of Cervantes, ed. Valentia, 1797, p. 12, from which it
appears that it was usual for money to be given to bystanders at play by
winners; and as he 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 gamester."

14— 3a PURGATORY, Canto VI. 189

Here of Arezzo him ' I BdW, wlio fell
By Ghino's cruel arm ; and him beside,2
Who in his chase was swallow'd by the stream.
Here Frederic Novello,3 with his hand
Stretch'd forth, entreated ; and of Pisa he,4
Who put the good Marzuco to such proof
Of constancy. Count Orso 6 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 : 6 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 others' prayers
To hasten on their state of blessedness ;
Straight I began : " 0 thou, my luminary !
It seems expressly in thy text 7 denied,

1 Of Arezzo him.] Benincasa of Arezzo, eminent for his skill in jurisprud-
ence, 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 us) 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 afterwards invited to Rome, and knighted by
Boniface VIII. A story is told of him by Boccaccio, G. x. N. 2.

2 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.

3 Frederic Novello.] Son of the Conte Guido da Battifolle, and slain by one
of the family of Bostoli.

4 Of Pisa he.] Farinata de' Scornigiani of Pisa. His father Marzuco, who
had entered the order of the Frati Minori, 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. The
eighteenth and thirtieth in the collection of Guittone dArezzo's Letters are
addressed to Marzuco. The latter is in verse.

5 Count Orso.] Son of Napoleone da Cerbaia, slain by Alberto da Mangona,
his uncle.

6 Peter de la Brosse.] Secretary of Philip III. of France. The courtiers,
envying the high place which he held in the king's favour, prevailed on Mary
of Brabant to charge him falsely with an attempt upon her person ; for which
supposed crime he suffered death. So say the Italian commentators. Henault
represents the matter very differently : " Pierre de la Brosse, formerly barber
to St. Louis, afterwards the favourite of Philip, fearing the too great attach-
ment of the king for his wife Mary, accuses this princess of having poisoned
Louis, eldest son of Philip, by his first marriage. This calumny is discovered by
a nun of Nivelle in Flanders. La Brosse is hung." Abrege" Chron. 1275, etc.
The Deputati, or those deputed to write annotations on the Decameron, suppose
that Boccaccio, in the Giornata ii. Novella 9, took the story from this passage
in Dante, only concealing the real names and changing the incidents in some
parts, in order not to wound the feelings of those whom, as it was believed,
these incidents had so lately befallen. Ediz. Giunti, 1573, p. 40.

7 In thy text] He refers to Virgil, uEn. lib. 6. 376 :

Desine fata deum flecii sperare precando.

190 THE VISION.

That heaven's supreme decree can ever bend
To supplication ; yet with this design
Do these entreat. Can then their hope be vain ?
Or is thy saying not to me reveal'd ? "

He thus to me : " Both what I write is plain,
And these deceived not in their hope ; if well
Thy mind consider, that the sacred height
Of judgment1 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,2
Upon this mountain's crown, fair seat of joy."

Then I : " Sir ! let us mend our speed ; for now
I tire not as before : and lo ! the hill 3
Stretches its shadow far." He answer'd thus :
" Our progress with this day shall be as much
As we may now dispatch ; but otherwise
Than thou supposest is the truth. For there
Thou canst not be, ere thou once more behold
Him back returning, 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,
Eyeing us as a lion on his watch.4
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,

The sacred height

Of judgment.'] So Shakspeare, Measure for Measure, act ii. sc. 2 :
If he, which is the top of judgment.

2 Above."] See Purg. c. xxx. v. 32.

3 The hill.] It was now past the noon.

* Eyeing us as a lion on his watch,] A guisa di leon quando si posa.
A line taken by Tasso, G. L. c. x. st. 56.

7:2—87. PURGATORY, Canto VI. 101

" Mantua," the shadow, in itself absorb'd,1
Rose towards us from the place in which it stood,
And cried, " Mantuan ! I am thy countryman,
Sordello." * Each the other then embraced.

Ah, slavish Italy ! thou inn of grief ! 3
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 4
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 thy sea-coasts wide ;
Then homeward to thy bosom turn ; and mark,

1 The shadow, in itself absorb'd.] I had before translated "The solitary
shadow ; " and have made the alteration in consequence of Monti's just remark
on the original, that tutta in se romita does not mean "solitary," but "col-
lected, concentrated in itself." See his Proposta under "Komito." Vellutello
had shown him the way to this interpretation, when he explained the words by
tutta in se raccolta e sola. Petrarch applies the expression to the spirit of
Laura, when departing from the body. See his Triumph of Death, cap. i. v.
152.

2 Sordello.] The history of Sordello's life is wrapt in the obscurity of
romance. That he distinguished himself by his skill in Provencal poetry is
certain ; and many feats of military prowess have been attributed to him. It
is probable that he was born towards the end of the twelfth, and died about
the middle of the succeeding century. Tiraboschi, who terms him the most
illustrious of all the Provencal poets of his age, has taken much pains to sift
all the notices he could collect relating to him, and has particularly exposed
the fabulous narrative which Platina has introduced on this subject in his
history of Mantua. Honourable mention of his name is made by our Poet in
the treatise Be Vidg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap. xv., where it is said that, remarkable as
he was for eloquence, he deserted the vernacular language of his own country,
not only in his poems, but in every other kind of writing. Tiraboschi had at
first concluded him to be the same writer whom Dante elsewhere {De Vulg.
Eloq. lib. 2. cap. xiii.) calls Gottus Mantuanus, but afterwards gave up that
opinion to the authority of the Conte d'Arco and the Abate Bettinelli. By
Bastero, in his Crusca Provenzcde, Ediz. Roma, 1724, p. 94, amongst Sordello's
MS. poems in the Vatican are mentioned "Canzoni, Tenzoni, Cobbole," and
various "Serventesi," particularly one in the form of a funeral song on the
death of Blancas, in which the poet reprehends all the reigning princes in
Christendom. This last was well suited to attract the notice of our author.
Mention of Sordello will recur in the Notes to the Paradise, c. ix. v. 32. Since
this note was written, many of Sordello's poems have been brought to light by
the industry of M. Raynouard in his Choix des Poisies des Troubadours and
his Lexique Roman.

3 Thou inn of grief.] S' io son d'ogni dolore ostello e chiave.

Vita Nuova di Dante, p. 225.

Thou most beauteous inn,

Why should hard-favour'd grief be lodged in thee ?

Shakspeare, Richard II. act v. sc. 1.

4 Thy living ones.] Compare Milton, P. L. b. ii. 496, etc.

192 THE VISION. 88—114.

If any part of thee sweet peace enjoy.

What boots it, that thy reins Justinian's hand 1

Refitted, if thy saddle be imprest ?

Nought doth he now but aggravate thy shame.

Ah, people ! thou obedient still shouldst live,

And in the saddle let thy Caesar sit,

If well thou marked'st that which God commands.2

Look how that beast to felness hath relapsed,
From having lost correction of the spur,
Since to the bridle thou hast set thine hand,
0 German Albert ! s 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 4 with dread ;
For that thy sire 5 and thou have suffer'd thus,
Through greediness of yonder realms detain'd,
The garden of the empire to run waste.
Come, see the Capulets and Montagues,6
The Filippeschi and Monaldi,7 man
Who carest for nought ! 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 supjily.8
Come and behold thy Rome,9 who calls on thee,

1 Justinian's hand.] " What avails it that Justinian delivered thee from the
Goths and reformed thy laws, if thou art no longer under the control of his
successors in the empire ? "

2 That which God commands.] He alludes to the precept — "Render unto
Caesar the things which are Caesar's."

3 0 German Albert !] The Emperor Albert I. succeeded Adolphus in 1298,
and was murdered in 1308. See Par. Canto xix. 114.

4 Thy successor.] The successor of Albert was Henry of Luxemburgh, by
whose interposition in the affairs of Italy our Poet hoped to have been reinstated
in his native city.

6 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."

6 Capidets and Montagues.] Our ears are so familiarized to the names of
these rival houses in the language of Shakspeare, that I have used them
instead of the "Montecchi" and "Cappelletti." They were two powerful
Ghibelline families of Verona. In some parts of that play, of which they form
the leading characters, our great dramatic poet seems to have been not a little
indebted to the Hadriana of Luigi Groto, commonly called II cieco d'Adria.
See Walker's Historical Memoir on Italian Tragedy, 4to, 1799, sec. 1, p. 49.

7 Filippeschi and Monaldi.] Two other rival families in Orvieto.

8 What safety Santafiore can supply.] A place between Pisa and Sienna.
What he alludes to is so doubtful, that it is not certain whether we should not
read "Come si cura" — "How Santafiore is governed." Perhaps the event
related in the Note to v. 58, Canto xi. may be pointed at.

9 Come and behold thy Rome.] Thus in the Latin Epistle to the Cardinals,
which has been lately discovered in the Laurentian library, and has every

115—150. PURGATORY, Canto VI. 193

Desolate widow, day and night with moans,
" My Caesar, why dost thou desert my side 1 "
Come, and behold what love among thy people :
And if no pity touches thee for us,
Come, and blush for thine oavii report. For me,
If it be lawful, 0 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 lip's edge. Many refuse 2
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 Lacedaemon, who of old
Enacted laws, for civil arts renown'd,
Made little progress in improving life
Towards 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,

appearance of being Dante's : " Roniani urbeni, nunc utroque luraine desti-
tutam, nunc Hannibali nedum aliis miserandam, solara sedentem et viduani,
prout superius proclamatur, qualis est, pro modulo nostne imaginis, ante
mortales oculos affigatis omnes." Opere minori cli Dante, torn. iii. Pte ii. p.
270. 12°, Fir. 1840.

1 Marcellus.'] Un Marcel diventa

Ogni villas che parteggiando viene.

Repeated by Alamanni in his Coltivazione, lib. 1. He probably means the
Marcellus who opposed Julius Csesar.

2 Many refuse.] He appears to have been of Plato's mind, that in a common-
wealth of worthy men, place and power would be as much declined as they are
now sought after and coveted, xit^umuu wiXts &v$$£v i.yx.BZjr h yiwib m»ilu.a.x*;Tov

»V UvOLl TO fjt.Yt Oi^E/y, UffXl$ VV¥ TO &§£WV. IIoX/T. lib. A.

N

194 THE VISION. 151-153.

Thou wilt perceive thyself like a sick wretch,1
Who finds no rest upon her clown, but oft
Shifting her side, short respite seeks from pain.

CANTO VII.

JUgumcnt.

The approach of night hindering farther 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.

After 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 answered him in few my gentle guide.

As one, who aught before him suddenly
Beholding, whence his wonder riseth, cries,
" It 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.2 " Glory of Latium ! " he exclaim'd,
" In whom our tongue its utmost power display'd ;
Boast of my honour'd birth-place ! what desert 3

1 A sick ivretch.'] Imitated by the Cardinal de Polignac in his Anti- Lucretius.
lib. 1. 1052 :

Ceu lectum peragrat membris languentibus seger,
In latus alterne lsevum dextrumque recumbens :
Nee juvat : inde oculos tollit resupinus in altum :
Nusquam inventa quies ; semper qusesita : quod illi
Primum in deliciis fuerat, mox torquet et angit :
Nee morbum sanat, nee fallit taedia morbi.

2 Where one of mean estate might clasp

His lord.] So Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xxiv. st. 19 :

E l'abbracciaro, ove il maggior s'abbraccia,
Col capo nudo e col ginocchio chino.

3 What desert.] So Frezzi :

Qual grazia, o qual destin m' ha fatto degno
Che io ti veggia. II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. ix.

18—57. PURGATORY, Canto VII. 195

Of mine, what favour,"rather, undeserved,

Shows thee to me ? If I to hear that voice

Am worth)'', 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,1

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 2

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 3 put not on,

But understood the rest,4 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 : upwards I may go, or round.
Far as I can, I join thee for thy guide.
But thou beholdest now how day declines ;
And upwards 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 1 " was answer'd : " whoso wish'd
To ascend by night, would he be thence debarr'd
By other, or through his own weakness fail 1 "

The good Sordello then, along the ground
Trailing his finger, spoke : " Only this line 5
Thou shalt not overpass, soon as the sun
Hath disappeared. ; not that aught else impedes
Thy going upwards, save the shades of night.
These, with the want of power, perplex the will.

1 Xotfor my doing.'] I am indebted to the kindness of Mr. Lyell for point-
ing out to me that three lines of the original were here omitted in the former
editions of this translation.

2 There is a place.'] Limbo. See Hell, Canto iv. 24.

3 The three holy virtues.] Faith, Hope, and Charity.

4 The rest.] Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance.

5 Only this line.] " Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon
you ; for he that walketh in darkness, knoweth not/ whither he goeth." John
xii. 35.

196 THE VISION. 58—82.

With tliem 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 srjeech,
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 1 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.
Kefulgent gold, and silver thrice refined,
And scarlet grain and ceruse, Indian wood 2
Of lucid dye serene, fresh emeralds 3
But newly broken, by the herbs and flowers
Placed in that fair recess, in colour all
Had been surpass'd, as great surpasses less.
Nor nature only there lavish'd her hues,
But of the sweetness 4 of a thousand smells
A rare and undistinguish'd fragrance made.

" Salve Eegina," 5 on the grass and flowers,

1 As large valleys.'] Viatores enim per viara rectam dam ambulant, campum
juxta viara cernentes spatiosum et pulchrum, oblitique itinera, dicunt intra
se, Iter per campum istum faciamus, etc. Alberici Visio, sec. 28.

2 Indian wood.] Indico legno lucido e sereno.

It is a little uncertain what is meant by this. Indigo, although it is ex-
tracted from a herb, seems the most likely. Monti in his Proposta maintains
it to be ebony.

3 Fresh emeralds.] Under foot the violet,

Crocus, and hyacinth with rich inlay

Broider'd the ground, more colour'd than with stone

Of costliest emblem. Milton, P. L. b. 4. 703.

Zaffir, rubini, oro, topazj, e perle,
E diamanti, e crisoliti e giacinti
Potriano i fiori assimigliar, che per le
Liete piagge v'avea l'aura dipinti ;
Si verdi l'erbe, che potendo averle
Qua giil ne foran gli smeraldi vinti.

Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xxxiv. st. 49.

4 The sweetness.] E quella ai fiori, ai pomi, e alia verzura

Gli odor diversi depredando giva,

E di tutti faceva una mistura,

Che di soavita l'alma notriva. Ibid. st. 51.

5 Salve Regina.] The beginning of a prayer to the Virgin. It is sufficient
here to observe, that in similar instances I shall either preserve the original
Latin words or translate them, as it may seem best to suit the purpose of the
verse.

83—112. PURGATORY, Canto VII. 197

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 lie should have done,
And to the others' song moves not his lip,
The Emperor Rodolph 1 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,2 where the water springs,
That Moldaw's river to the Elbe, and Elbe
Rolls to the ocean : Ottocar 3 his name :
Who in his swaddling clothes was of more worth
Than Winceslaus his son, a bearded man,
Pamper d with rank luxuriousness and ease.
And that one with the nose deprest,4 who close
In counsel seems with him of gentle look,5
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 sighs.
They are the father and the father-in-law
Of Gallia's bane : 6 his vicious life they know
And foul ; thence comes the grief that rends them thus.

i The Emperor Rodolph.'] See the last Canto, v. 104. He died in 1291.

2 That country.] Bohemia.

3 Ottocar.] King of Bohemia, who was killed in the battle of Marchfield,
fought with Rodolph, August 26, 1278. Winceslaus 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.

4 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.

5 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."

6 Gallia's bane.] G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. cxlvi., speaks with equal resent-
ment of Philip IV. " In 1291, on the night of the calends of May, Philip lc
Bel, King of France, by advice of Biccio and Musciatto 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."

198 THE VISION. 113-130.

" He, so robust of limb,1 who measure keeps
In song with him of feature prominent,2
With every virtue bore his girdle braced.
And if that stripling,3 who behind him sits,
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 4 his realms are held ;
Neither the better heritage obtains.
Barely 5 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 6 my words apply
No less than to his brother in the song ;
Which Pouille and Provence now with grief confess.
So much that plant degenerates from its seed,
As, more than Beatrix and Margaret,
Costanza 7 still boasts of her valorous spouse.

1 He so robust of limb.] Peter III., called the Great, King of Arragou, who
died in 1285, leaving four sons, Alonzo, James, Frederick, and Peter. Tl it-
two former succeeded him in the kingdom of Arragon, and Frederick in that
of Sicily. See G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. cii. and Mariana, lib. 14. cap. ix. He
is enumerated among the Provencal poets by Millot, Hist. Litt. des Troubadours,
torn. iii. p. 150.

2 Him of feature prominent.'] "Dal maschio naso" — "with the masculine
nose." Charles I., King of Naples, Count of Anjou, and brother of St. Louis.
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 lofti-
ness of his understanding." G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. xciv. We shall, however,
find many of his actions severely reprobated in the twentieth Canto.

3 That stripling.'] Either (as the old commentators suppose) Alonzo III.,
King of Arragon, the eldest son of Peter III. who died in 1291, at the age
of 27 ; or, according to Venturi, Peter the youngest son. The former was a
young prince of virtue sufficient to have justified the eulogium and the hopes
of Dante. See Mariana, lib. 14. cap. xiv.

4 By James and Frederick.] See Note to Canto iii. 112.

5 Rarely.] Full well can the Avise poet of Florence,

That hight Dantes, speake in this sentence ;

Lo ! in such manner rime is Dantes tale.

Full selde upriseth by his branches smale

Prowesse of man, for God of his goodnesse

Woll that we claim of him our gentlenesse :

For of our elders may we nothing claime

But temporal thing, that men may hurt and maime.

Chaucer, Wife of Bathe's Tale.

Compare Homer, Od. b. 2. v. 276 ; Pindar, Nem. xi. 48 ; and Euripides,
Electra, 369.

6 To Charles.] " Al Nasuto " — "Charles II., King of Naples, is no less in-
ferior to his father Charles I. than James and Frederick to theirs, Peter III."
See Canto xx. 78, and Paradise, Canto xix. 125.

7 Costanza.] Widow of Peter III. She has been already mentioned in
the third Canto, v. 112. By Beatrix and Margaret are probably meant two of

131—138. PURGATORY, Canto VIII. 199

" Behold the king of simple life and plain,
Harry of England,1 sitting there alone :
He through his branches better issue 2 spreads.

" That one, who, on the ground, beneath the rest,
Sits lowest, yet his gaze directs aloft,
Is William, that brave Marquis,3 for whose cause,
The deed of Alexandria and his war
Makes Montferrat and Canavese weep."

CANTO VIII.

JUjgtutunt.

Two angels, with flaming swords broken at the points, descend to keep watch
over tlie 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 approach of those angelic guards. Lastly, Conrad Malaspina
predicts to our Poet his future banishment.

Now was the hour that wakens fond desire
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

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.

1 Harry of England.] Henry III. The contemporary annalist speaks of
this king in similar terms. G. Villani, lib. 5. cap. iv. : "From Richard was
born Henry, who reigned after him, who was a plain man and of good faith,
but of little courage." With the exception of the last part of the sentence,
which must be changed for its opposite, we might well imagine ourselves to be
reading the character of our present venerable monarch (A.D. 1819). Fazio
degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 4. cap. xx v. , where he gives the characters of our
Norman kings, speaks less respectfully of Henry. Capitoli xxiii.-xxv. lib. 4.
of this neglected poem appear to deserve the notice of our antiquarians.

2 Better issue.] Edward I., of whose glory our poet was perhaps a witness,
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.

3 William, that brave Marquis.] William, Marquis of Montferrat, was
treacherously seized by his own subjects, at Alessandria in Lombardy, A.D.
1290, and ended his life in prison. See G. Villani, lib. 7. cap. cxxxv. A war
ensued between the people of Alessandria and those of Montferrat and the
Canavese, now a part of Piedmont.

203 THE VISION. 5—22.

Thrills, if he hear the vesper bell from far,1
That seems to mourn for the expiring day : 2
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 stedfast gaze toward the east,
As telling God, " I care for nought beside."

" Te Lucis Ante," 3 so devoutly then
Came from its lip, and in so soft a strain,
That all my sense 4 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 ! 5 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.

I saw that gentle band silently next

1 Hear the vesper bell from far.]

I hear the far-off curfeu sound. Milton's Penseroso.
- That seems to mourn for the expiring day.]

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day. Gray's Elegy.

giorno — che si muore

is from Statius :

Jain moriente die. Sylv. lib. iv. 6. 3.

3 Te Lucis Ante.] "Te lucis ante terminum," says Lombardi, is the first
verse of the hymn sung by the church in the last part of the sacred office
termed compieta, a service which our Chaucer calls "complin."

4 All my sense.] Fece me a me uscir di mente.

Me surpuerat mihi. Horat. Carm. lib. 4. od. 13.

5 Here, reader!] Lombardi's explanation of this passage, by which the com-
mentators have been much perplexed, though it may be thought rather too
subtle and fine-spun, like the veil itself spoken of in the text, cannot be denied
the praise of extraordinary ingenuity. " This admonition of the Poet to his
reader," he observes, " seems to relate to what has been before said, that these,
spirits sung the whole of the hymn ' Te lucis ante terminum' throughout, even
that second strophe of it —

Procul recedant somnia, Hostemque nostrum comprime,

Et noctium phantasmata, Ne polluantur corpora ;

and he must imply, that these souls, being incorporeal, did not offer up this
petition on their own account, but on ours, who are yet in this world ; as he
afterwards makes those other spirits, who repeat the Pater Noster, expressly
declare, when after that prayer they add,

This last petition, dearest Lord ! is made
Not for ourselves, etc. Canto xi.

As, therefore, if we look through a very fine veil, the sight easily passes on,
without perceiving it, to objects that lie on the other side ; so here the Poet
fears that our mind's eye may insensibly pass on to contemplate these spirits,
as if they were praying for the relief of their own wants ; without discovering
the veil of our wants, with which they invest themselves in the act of offering
up this prayer."

23-64 PURGATORY, Canto VIII. 201

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,

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 towards each other we advanced.
Nino, thou courteous judge ! 2 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

1 As faculty.] My earthly by his heavenly overpower'd

As with an object, that excels the sense,

Dazzled and spent. Milton, P. L. b. 8. 457.

2 Nino, thou courteous judge.'] Nino di Gallura de' Visconti, nephew to
Count Ugolino de' Gherardeschi, and betrayed by him. See Notes to Hell,
Canto xxxiii.

202 THE VISION. 65—89.

Was seated, crying : " Conrad ! 1 up with speed :

Come, see what of his grace high God hath will'd."

Then turning round to me : "By that rare mark

Of honour, 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,2 that for me she call

There, where reply to innocence is made.

Her mother,3 I believe, loves me no more ;

Since she has changed the white and wimpled folds,4

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,5 which calls Milan to the field,

As had been made by shrill Gallura's bird." G

He spoke, and in his visage took the stamp
Of that right zeal, which with due temperature
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 answered : " The three torches/ with which here

1 Conrad.] Currado, father to Marcello Malaspina.

2 My Giovanna.] The daughter of Nino, and wife of Eiccardo da Camino
of Trevigi, concerning whom see Paradise, c. ix. 48.

3 Her mother.] Beatrice, Marchioness of Este, wife of Nino, and after his
death married to Galeazzo de' Visconti of Milan. It is remarked by Lom-
bardi, that the time which Dante assigns to this journey, and consequently to
this colloquy with Nino Visconti, the beginning, that is, of April, is prior to
the time which Bernardino Corio, in his history of Milan, part the second,
fixes for the nuptials of Beatrice with Galeazzo ; for he records her having been
betrothed to that prince after the May of this year (1300), and her having been
solemnly espoused at Modena on the 29th of June. Besides, however, the
greater credit due to Dante, on account of his having lived at the time when
these events happened, another circumstance in his favour is the discrepancy
remarked by Giovambatista Giraldi (Commentar. delle cose di Ferrara) in
those writers by whom the history of Beatrice's life has been recorded.
Nothing can set the general accuracy of our Poet, as to historical facts, in a
stronger point of view, than the difficulty there is in convicting him of even
so slight a deviation from it as is here suspected.

4 The white and loimpled folds.] The weeds of widowhood.

5 The viper.] The arms of Galeazzo and the ensign of the Milanese.

0 Shrill Gallura's bird.] The cock was the ensign of Gallura, Nino's
province in Sardinia. Hell. xxii. 80, and Notes. 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.

7 The three torches.] The three evangelical virtues, Faith, Hope, and
Charity. These are supposed to rise in the evening, in order to denote their
belonging to the contemplative : as the four others which are made to rise in

90—128. PURGATORY, Canto VIII. 203

The pole is all on fire." 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,
Such haply as gave Eve the bitter food.1
Between the grass and flcvvers, 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,2 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 3 and the neighbour part
Thou know'st, tell me, who once was mighty there.
They call'd me Conrad Malaspina ; not
That old one ; 4 but from him I sprang. The love
I bore my people is now here refined."

"In 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 1
The fame, that honours 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 honour'd nation not impairs
The value of her coffer and her sword.

the morning, were probably intended to signify 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.

1 Such haply as gave Eve the bitter food.'] Compare Milton's description of
that serpent in the ninth book of the Paradise Lost.

2 May the lamp.] " May the divine grace find so hearty a co-operation
on the part of thy own will, as shall enable thee to ascend to the terrestrial
paradise, which is on the top of this mountain. "

A Valdimagra.'] See Hell, Canto xxiv. 144, and Notes.
4 That old one.] An ancestor of Conrad Malaspina, who was also of that
name.

204 THE VISION. 129—138-

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 :

Eevisits 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 dreaming, by Lueia ; and, on
wakening, finds himself, two hours after sunrise, with Virgil, near the
gate of Purgatory, through which they are admitted by the angel deputed
by Saint Peter to keep it.

Now the fair consort of Tithonus old,2
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,3 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,4

1 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 received by the Marchese Marcello,
or Morello Malaspina, during his banishment, A.D. 1307.

2 Now the fair consort of Tithonus old.] La concubina di Titone antico.
So Tassoni, Secchia Rapita, c. viii. st. 15 : La puttanella del canuto amante.
Venturi, after some of the old commentators, interprets this to mean an
Aurora, or dawn of the moon ; but this seems highly improbable. From what
follows it may be conjectured, that our Poet intends us to understand that it
was now near the break of day.

3 Of that chill anvmal.] The scorpion.

4 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
towards its close, which would still leave an insurmountable difficulty in the
first verse. At the beginning of Canto xv. our Poet makes the evening
commence three hours before sunset, and he may now consider the dswn as
beginning at the same distance from sunrise. Those, who would have the

B— 22. PURGATORY, Canto IX. 205

When I, who had so much of Adam with me,

Sank down niton the grass, o'ercome with sleep,

There where all five l were seated. In that hour,

When near the dawn the swallow her sad lay,

Remembering haply ancient grief,2 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 3 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.

dawn, spoken of in the first verse of the present Canto, to signify the rising of
the moon, construe the " two steps of her ascent which the night had past,"
into as many hours, and not watches ; so as to make it now about the third
hour of the night. The old Latin annotator on the Monte Casino MS. alone,
as far as I know, supposing the division made by St. Isidore (Orig. lib. 5.) of
the night into seven parts to be adopted by our Poet, concludes that it was
the third of these ; and he too, therefore, is for the lunar dawn. Rosa
Moranda ingenuously confesses, that to him the whole passage is "non
esplicabile o almeno difficillimo," inexplicable, or, at best, extremely difficult.

1 All five.'] Virgil, Dante, Sordello, Nino, and Currado Malaspina. ■

2 Remembering haply ancient grief.'] Progne having been changed into a
swallow after the outrage done her by Tereus. See Ovid, Metam. lib. 6.

3 A golden-feather'd eagle.] So Chaucer, in the House of Fame, at the con-
clusion of the first book and beginning of the second, represents himself carried
up by the " grim pawes " of a golden eagle. Much of his description is closely
imitated from Dante : —

Methought I saw an eagle sore.

It was of golde and shone so bright,
That never sawe men soche a sight.

The House of Fame, b. 1.
This eagle, of which I have you tolde,
That with fethirs shone al of golde,
Whiche that so hie gan to sore,
I gan beholdin more and more
To seen her beautee and the wonder,
But never was that dente of thonder,
Ne that thinge that men callin foudre,
That smite sometime a toure to poudre,
And in his swifte comminge brend,
That so SAvithe gan downwarde discende
As this foule whan that it behelde,
That I a roume was in the felde,
And with his grim pawes stronge,
Within his sharpe nailis longe,
Me fleyng at a swappe he hent, etc.

Ibid. b. 2.

" Avis Candida columba; similis adveniens per comam capitis suo

me ore apprehendens ferre sublimem cepit." Alberici Visio, sec. 1.

206 THE VISION. 23-07.

" Perhaps/5 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 snateh'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 erst

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 l 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 Lucia.2 Suffer me to take this man,

' Who slumbers. Easier so his way 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

He moved, and I behind him, towards 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

1 There.] Mr. Darley has noted the omission of this line in the preceding
editions.

2 Lucia.'] See Hell, c. ii. 97, and Paradise, c. xxxii. 123.

68—108. PURGATORY, Canto IX. 207

As of a wall appear'd, I could descry

A portal, and three steps beneath, that led (

For inlet there, of different colour 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,

In visage such, as past my power to bear.

Grasp'd in his hand, a naked sword glanced back

The rays so towards 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.5 " — " 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 1 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
My leader cheerly drew me. " Ask," said he,
"With humble heart, that he unbar the bolt."

Piously at his holy feet devolved
I cast me, praying him for pity's sake
That he would open to me ; but first fell
Thrice on my bosom prostrate. Seven times 2
The letter, that denotes the inward stain,
He, on my forehead, with the blunted point
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 colour with the robe he wore.
From underneath that vestment forth he drew

1 The Imvest stair.] By the white step is meant the distinctness with which
the conscience of the penitent reflects his offences ; by the burnt and cracked
one, his contrition on their account ; and by that of porphyry, the fervour
with which he resolves on the future pursuit of piety and virtue. Hence, no
doubt, Milton describing " the gate of heaven," P. L. b. 3. 516 :

Each stair mysteriously was meant.

2 Seven times.'] Seven P's, to denote the seven sins (Peccata) of which he
was to be cleansed in his passage through Purgatory.

208 THE VISION. 109-134.

Two keys,1 of metal twain : the one was gold,

Its fellow silver. 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 : 2 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

Kather 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 ;3 nor so surlily
Koar'd the Tarpeian,4 Avlien 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, 0 God," methought I heard,
In accents blended with sweet melody.

1 Two keys.] Lombardi remarks, that painters have usually drawn Saint
Peter with two keys, the one of gold and the other of silver ; but that Niccolo
Alemanni, in his Dissertation de Parietinis Latcranensibus, produces instances
of his being represented with one key, and with three. We have here, how-
ever, not Saint Peter, but an angel deputed by him.

2 One is more precious J] The golden 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.

3 Harsh was the grating.]

On a sudden open fly

With impetuous recoil and jarring sound
The infernal doors, and on their hinges grate
Harsh thunder. Milton, P. L. b. 2. 882.

1 The Tarpeian.]

Protinus abducto patuerunt templa Metello.

Tunc rupes Tarpeia sonat : magnoque reclusas

Testatur stridore fores : tunc conditus imo

Eruitur templo multis intactus ab annis

Romani census populi, etc. Lucan, Ph. lib. 3. 157.

The tribune with unwilling steps withdrew,

While impious hands the rude assault renew ;

The brazen gates with thundering strokes resound,

And the Tarpeian mountain rings around.

At length the sacred storehouse, open laid,

The hoarded wealth of ages past displayed. Rowe.

135—138. PURGATORY, Canto X. 209

The strains came o'er mine ear, e'en as the sound
Of choral voices, that in solemn chant
With organ l mingle, and, now high and clear
Come swelling, now float indistinct away.

CANTO X.

^Uattmott.

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 approach the souls of those who expiate the sin of
pride, and who are bent down beneath the weight of heavy stones.

When we had past 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 1

We mounted up the riven rock, that wound 2
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

1 Organ.'] Organs were used in Italy as early as in the sixth century. See
Tiraboschi, Stor. della Lett. Ital. 4to, vol. iii. lib. 3. cap. i. sec. 11, where the
following description of that instrument is quoted from Cassiodorus, in Psalm.
150: — " Organum itaque est quasi turris diversis fistulis fabricata, quibus
flatu follium vox copiosissima destinatur, et ut earn modulatio decora componat,
linguis quibusdam ligneis ab interiore parte construitur, quas disciplinabiliter
Magistrorum digiti reprimentes grandisonam efliciunt et suavisonam cantile-
nara." If I remember right, there is a passage in the Emperor Julian's writ-
ings, which shows that the organ was not unknown in his time.

■ That wound.] Venturi justly observes, that the Padro d' Aquino has
misrepresented the sense of this passage in his translation :

dabat ascensum tendentibus ultra

Scissa tremensque silex, tenuique erratica motu.

The verb "muover" is used in the same signification in the Inferno, Canto
xviii. 21 :

Cosi da imo della roccia scogli from the rock's low base

Moven. Thus flinty paths advanced.

In neither place is actual motion intended to be expressed.

O

210 THE VISION. 15—52.

One solid mass retires ; I spent with toil,1

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,

To leftward now and now to right dispatch'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 ; and 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 ! " 2 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 past 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.3

1 1 spent with toil.] Daute only was wearied, because he only had the
weight of a bodily frame to encumber him.

2 Hail.] On whom the angel Hail

Bestow'd, the holy salutation used

Long after to blest Mary, second Eve. Milton, P. L. 5. 387.

" The basso relievo on the border of the second rock, in Purgatory, furnished
the idea of the Annunziata, painted by Marcello Venusti from his (Michael
Angelo's) design in the sacristy of St. Giov. Lateran." Fuseli, Lecture iii.
Note.

3 That from unbidden office awes mankind.] "And when they came to
Nachon's threshing-floor, Uzzah put forth his hand to the ark of God, and

53-81. PURGATORY, Canto X. 211

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 l the blest vessel, onward came

With light dance leaping, girt in humble guise,

Israel's sweet harper : in that hap he seeni'd

Less, and yet more, than kingly. Opposite,

At a great palace, from the lattice forth

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 2 to earn

His mighty conquest, Trajan the Emperor.3

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,4 struggling with the wind.

The wretch appear'd amid all these to say :

" Grant vengeance, Sire ! for, woe beshrew this neart,

My son is murder'd." He replying seem'd :

" Wait now till I return." And she, as one

Made hasty by her grief : " 0 Sire ! if thou

Dost not return ?" — "Where I am, who then is,

May right thee." — " What to thee is other's good,

If thou neglect thy own % " — " Now comfort thee ; "

took hold of it ; for the oxen shook it. And the anger of the Lord was
kindled against Uzzah ; and God smote him there for his error ; and there he
died by the ark of God." 2 Sam. vi. 6, 7.

1 Preceding.'] " And David danced before the Lord with all his might ; and
David was girded with a linen ephod." 2 Sam. vi. 14.

2 Gregory.] St. Gregory's prayers are said to have delivered Trajan from
Hell. See Paradise, Canto xx. 40.

3 Trajan tJie Emperor.] For this story, Landino refers to two writers, whom
he calls " Helinando," of France, by whom he means Elinand, a monk and
chronicler, in the reign of Philip Augustus, and " Polycrato," of England, by
whom is meant John of Salisbury, author of the Polycraticus de Curialium
Nugis, in the twelfth century. The passage in the text I find nearly a trans-
lation from that work, lib. 5. cap. viii. The original appears to be in Dio Cassius,
where it is told of the Emperor Hadrian, lib. 69. kpikti yvv<x.ixos, *. r. A. "When
a woman appeared to him with a suit, as he was on a journey, at first he
answered her, ' I have no leisure ;' but she crying out to him, ' Then reign no
longer,' he turned about, and heard her cause." Lombardi refers also to
Johannes Diaconus. Vita S. Gregor. lib. 2. cap. xliv. ; the Euchology of the
Greeks, cap. xcvi. ; and St. Thomas Aquinas, Supplem. Qucest. 73, art. 5 ad 5.
Compare Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. vi.

4 The eagles floated.] See Perticari's Letter on this passage. Opere, vol. iii.
p. 552, ed. Bol. 1823. The eagles were of metal ; not worked on a standard,
as Villain supposed.

212 THE VISION. 82—118.

#
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 1 not
The form of suffering. Think on what succeeds :
Think that, at worst, beyond the mighty doom
It cannot pass. " Instructor ! " I began,
" 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 courb'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 labouring view,
What, underneath those stones, approacheth : now,
E'en now, mayst thou discern the jDangs of each."

Christians and proud ! 0 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,2 imp'd with angel plumes,
That to heaven's justice unobstructed soars ?
Why buoy ye up aloft your unfledged souls ?
Abortive 3 then and shapeless ye remain,
Like the untimely embryon of a worm.

1 Ponder.] This is, in truth, an unanswerable objection to the doctrine of
Purgatory. It is difficult to conceive how the best can meet death without
horror, if they believe it must be followed by immediate and intense suffering.

2 The winged insect.] L'angelica farfalla. The butterfly was an ancient
and well-known symbol of the human soul. Venturi cites some lines from the
Canzoni Anacreontiche of Magalotti, in which this passage is imitated.

3 Abortive.] The word in the original is entomata. Some critics, and
Salvini amongst the rest, have sxipposed that Dante, finding in a vocabulary
the Greek word ivrouee. with the article rot placed after it to denote its gender,
mistook them for one word. From this error he is well exculpated by Rosa
Morando in a passage quoted by Lorabardi from the Osserv. Farad. III., where
it is shown that the Italian word is formed, for the sake of the verse, in analogy
with s'Mne others used by our Poet ; and that Redi himself, an excellent Greek

119-128. PURGATORY, Canto XL 213

As, to support1 incumbent floor of 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."

CANTO XL

Argument.

After a prayer uttered by the spirits, who were spoken of in the last Canto,
Virgil inquires the way upwards, and is answered by one, who declares
himself to have been Omberto, son of the Count of Santafiore. Next onr
Poet distinguishes Oderigi, the illuminator, who discourses on the vanity
of worldly fame, and points out to him the soul of Provenzano Salvani.

" O thou Almighty Father ! 2 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

scholar and a very accurate writer, has even in prose, where such licences are
less allowable, thus lengthened it. It may be considered as some proof of our
author's acquaintance with the Greek language, that in the Convito, p. 26, he
finds fault with the version of Aristotle's Ethics made by Taddeo d'Alderotto,
the Florentine physician ; and that in the treatise De Monarchic, lib. 1. p. 110,
he quotes a Greek word from Aristotle himself. On the other hand, he speaks
of a passage in the same writer being doubtful, on account of its being differ-
ently interpreted in two different translations, a new and an old one. Convito,
p. 75. And for the word "autentin," he refers to a vocabulary compiled by
Uguccione Bentivegna of Pisa, a MS. that is, perhaps, still remaining, as
Cinelli, in his MS. history of Tuscan writers, referred to by Biscioni in the
notes on the Convito, p. 142, speaks of it as being preserved in the library of
S. Francesco at Cesena. After all, Dante's knowledge of Greek must remain
as questionable as Shakspeare's of that language and of Latin.

1 As, to support.] Chillingworth, cap. vi. sec. 54, speaks of " those crouching
anticks, which seem in great buildings to labour under the weight they bear."
And Lord Shaftesbury has a similar illustration in his Essay on Wit and
Humour, p. 4, sec. 3.

2 0 thou Almighty Father.] The first four lines are borrowed by Pulci,
Morg. Magg. c. vi. Dante, in his "Credo," has again versified the Lord's
Prayer, if, indeed, the " Credo" be Dante's, which some have doubted ; and in
the preface to Allacci's Collection it is ascribed to Antonio di Ferrara.

214 THE VISION. 7—51.

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 their's 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 clone by such, whose wills
Have root of goodness in them ? 1 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 lieshly 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

1 Such, whose wills

Have root of goodness in them.'] The Poet has before told us, that there
are no others on earth whose prayers avail to shorten the pains of those who
are in Purgatory.

52—88. PUKGATORY, Canto XI. 215

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 ; x 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.

I am Omberto : not me, only, pride

Hath injured, but my kindred all involved

In mischief with her. Here my lot ordains

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. " 0 ! " I exclaim'd,
" Art thou not Oderigi ? 2 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 3 pencil lines the leaves.
His all the honour 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.4

1 I was of Latium.] Omberto, the son of Guglielmo Aldobrandesco, Count
of Santafiore, in the territory of Sienna. His arrogance provoked his country-
men to such a pitch of fury against him, that he was murdered by them at
Campagnatico.

2 Oderigi.'] The illuminator, or miniature painter, a friend of Giotto and
Dante.

3 Bolognian Franco.] Franco of Bologna, who is said to have been a pupil
of Oderigi's.

4 The forfeiture is paid.] Di tal superbia qui si paga il fio.
So in the Inferno, c. xxvii. 135 :

in che si paga il fio.

And Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xxii. 59 :

Prestate ola, che qui si paga il fio.

216 THE VISION. 89—96.

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.1 Cimabue2 thought

To lord it over painting's field ; and now

The cry is Giotto's,3 and his name eclipsed.

Thus hath one Guido from the other 4 snatch'd

-//" an age

• Less bright succeed not.] If a generation of men do not follow, among
whom none exceeds or equals those who have immediately preceded them.
" Etati grosse ;" to which Volpi remarks a similar expression in Boileau :

Villon sivt le premier, dans ces siecles grossiers,

Debrouiller l'art confus de nos vieux romanciers. Art Poetique, ch. i.

2 Cimabue.] Giovanni Cimabue, the restorer of painting, was born at
Florence, of a noble family, in 1240, and died in 1300. The passage in the
text is au allusion to his epitaph :

Credidit ut Cimabos picturae castra tenere,
Sic tenuit vivens : nunc tenet astra poli.

3 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 tending sheep for his father in the neighbourhood of Florence,
and he was afterwards patronized by Pope Benedict XI. and Robert King of
Naples ; and enjoyed the society and friendship of Dante, whose likeness he
has transmitted to posterity. He died in 1336, at the age of 60.

4 One Guido from the other.] Guido Cavalcanti, the friend of our Poet,
(see Hell, Canto' x. 59,) had eclipsed the literary fame of Guido Guinicelli, of a
noble family in Bologna, whom we shall meet with in the twenty-sixth Canto,
and of whom frequent and honourable mention is made by our Poet in his
treatise De Vulg. Eloq. Guinicelli died in 1276, as is proved by Fantuzzi, on
the Bolognian writers, torn. iv. p. 345. See Mr. Mathias's Tiraboschi, torn. i.
p. 110. There are more of Guinicelli's poems to be found in Allacci's Collection,
than Tiraboschi, who tells us he had not seen it, supposed. From these I have
selected two which appear to me singularly pathetic. It must, however, be
observed that the former of them is attributed in the Vatican MS. 3213, to Cino
da Pistoia, as Bottari informs us in the notes to Lettere di Fra Guittone
d'Arezzo, p. 171. Many of Cavalcanti's writings, hitherto in MS., are said to
be publishing at Florence. See Esprit des Journaux, Jan. 1813. [They were
edited there in that year, but not for sale, by Antonio Cicciaporci, as I learn
from Gamba's Testi di Lingua Ital. 272.]

Noi provamo ch' in questo cieco mondo
Ciascun si vive in angosciosa doglia,
Ch' in onni avversita Ventura '1 tira.
Beata 1' alma che lassa tal pondo.
E va nel ciel, dove e compita zoglia,
Zoglioso cor far de corrotto e dira.
Or dunque di chel vostro cor sospira
Che rallegrar si de del suo migliore,
Che Dio, nostro signore,
Volse di lei, come avea l'angel detto,
Fare il ciel perfetto.
Per nuova cosa ogni santo la mira :
Ed ella sta d'avante alia salute ;
Ed in ver lei pari a ogni vertute.

Allacci, Ediz. Napoli, 1661, p- 378.

1)7— 1)1). PURGATORY, Canto XI. 217

The letter'd prize : and lie, perhaps, is born,1
Who shall drive either from their nest. The noise
Of worldly fame is but a blast of wind,

By proof, in this blind mortal world, we know,
That each one lives in grief and sore annoy ;
Such ceaseless strife of fortune we sustain.
Blessed the soul, that leaves this weight below,
And goes its way to heaven, where it hath joy
Entire, without a touch of wrath or pain.
Now then what reason hath thy heart to sigh
That should be glad, as for desire fulfill'd,
That God, our Sovereign, will'd
She, as He told His angel, should be given
To bless and perfect heaven ?
Each saint looks on her with admiring eye ;
And she stands ever in salvation's sight ;
And every virtue bends on her its light.

Conforto gia conforto l'amor chiama,
E pieta prega per Dio, fatti resto ;
Or v' inchinate a si dolce preghiera ;
Spogliatevi di questa vesta grama,
Da che voi sete per ragion richiesto.
Che l'uomo per dolor more e dispera.
Con voi vedeste poi la bella ciera.
Se v' accogliesse morte in disperanza,
De si grave pesanza
Traete il vostro cor ormai per Dio,
Che non sia cosi rio
Ver l'alma vostra che ancora spiera
Vederla in ciel e star nelle sue braccia,
Dunque spene de confortar vi piaccia.

Allacci, Ediz. Napoli, 1661, p. 380.

"Comfort thee, comfort thee," exclaimeth Love ;

And pity by thy God adjures thee "rest : "

Oh then incline ye to such gentle prayer ;

Nor Reason's plea should ineffectual prove,

Who bids ye lay aside this dismal vest :

For man meets death through sadness and despair.

Amongst you ye have seen a face so fair :

Be this in mortal mourning some relief.

And, for more balm of grief,

Rescue thy spirit from its heavy load,

Remembering thy God ;

And that in heaven thou hopest again to share

In sight of her, and with thine arms to fold :

Hope then ; nor of this comfort quit thy hold.

To these I will add a sonnet by the same writer, from the poems printed
with the Bella Mano of Giusto de' Conti. Ediz. 1715, p. 167.

Io vo dal ver la mia donna laudare,
E rassembrarla alia rosa, ed al giglio.
Piu che stella Diana splende, e pare,
Cio che lassii e bello a lei somiglio.

1 For note, see p. 219.

218 THE VISION. 100—102.

That blows from diverse points, and shilcs its name,
Shifting the point it "blows from. Shalt thou more
Live in the mouths of mankind, if thy flesh

Verdi rivere a lei rassembro, Tare,

Tutto color di porpora, e vermiglio,

Oro, ed argento, e ricche gioie preclare ;

Medesmo amor per lei raffina miglio.
Passa per via adorna, e si gentile,

Cui bassa orgoglio, a cui dona salute,

E fal di nostra fe, se non la crede.
E non le puo appressare, uom che sia vile,

Ancor ve ne diro maggior vertute,

Nullo uoni puo mal pensar finehe la vede.

I would from truth my lady's praise supply,

Resembling her to lily and to rose ;

Brighter than morning's lucid stars she shows,

And fair as that which fairest is on high.
To the blue wave, I liken her, and sky,

All colour that with pink and crimson glows,

Gold, silver and rich stones : nay, lovelier grows

E'en love himself, when she is standing by.
She passeth on so gracious and so mild,

One's pride is quench'd, and one of sick is well :

And they believe, who from the faith did err ;
And none may near her come by harm defiled.

A mightier virtue have I yet to tell ;

No man may think of evil, seeing her.

The two following sonnets of Guido Cavalcanti may enable the reader to
form some judgment whether Dante had sufficient reason for preferring him
to his predecessor Guinicelli :

Io temo che la mia disavventura

Non faccia si ch' io dico io mi dispero,

Pero ch' io sen to nel cor un pensero,

Che fa tremar la mente di paura.
E par ch' ei dica : Amor non t'assicura

In guisa che tu possa di leggiero

Alia tua donna si contare il vero,

Che morte non ti ponga in sua figura.
Delia gran doglia, che l'anima sente,

Si parte dallo core un tal sospiro

Che va dicendo : spiritei fuggite ;
Allor null' uom, che sia pietoso, miro ;

Che consolasse mia vita dolente,

Dicendo : spiritei non vi partite.

Anecdota Literaria ex MSS. Codicibus eruta.
Ediz. Roma, (no year,) vol. hi. p. 452.

I fear lest my mischance may so prevail.
That it may make me of myself despair.
For, my heart searching, I discover there
A thought that makes the mind with terror quail.

It says, meseemeth, " Love shall not avail
To strengthen thee so much, that thou shalt dare
Tell her, thou lovest, thy passion or thy prayer,
To save from power of death thy visage pale."

103—115. PURGATORY, Canto XL 219

Part shrivel'd from thee, than if thou haclst died

Before the coral and the pap were left ;

Or e'er some thousand years have past ? 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 now is loathsome. Your renown

Is as the herb, whose hue doth come and go ;

Through the dread sorrow that o'erwhelms my soul,
There issues from my bosom such a sigh,
As passeth, crying : "Spirits, flee away."

And then, when I am fainting in my dole,
No man so merciful there standeth by,
To comfort me, and answer, "Spirits, stay."

Belta di donna, e di saccente core,

E cavalieri armati, che sian genti,

Cantar d'augelli, e ragionar d'amore,

Adorni legni in mar, forti e correnti :
Aria serena, quando appar l'albore,

E bianca neve scender senza venti,

Eivera d'acqua, e prato d'ogni fiore,

Oro, e argento, azurro in ornamenti :
Cio che pud la beltate, e la valenza

Delia mia donna in suo gentil coraggio,

Par che rassembra vile a chi cio guarda.
E tanto ha piu d'ogni altra conoscenza,

Quanto lo Ciel di questa terra e maggio,

A simil di natura ben non tarda.

La Bella Mano e Rime Antiche, Ediz. Fir. 1715, p. 128.

Whatso is fair in lady's face or mind,

And gentle knights caparison'd and gay,
Singing of sweet birds unto love inclined,

And gallant barks that cut the watery way ;
The white snow falling without any wind,

The cloudless sky at break of early day,
The crystal stream, with flowers the meadow lined,

Silver, and gold, and azure for array :
To him that sees the beauty and the worth

Whose power doth meet and in my lady dwell,

All seem as vile, their price and lustre gone.
And, as the heaven is higher than the earth,

So she in knowledge doth each one excel,

Not slow to good in nature like her own.

1 lie, perhaps, is born.'] Some imagine, with much probability, that
Dante here augurs the greatness of his own poetical reputation. Others have
absurdly fancied that he prophesies the glory of Petrarch. But Petrarch was
not yet born. Lombardi doubts whether it is not spoken generally of human
vicissitudes.

220 THE VISION. 116—142.

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 tumours 1 rankle there. But who is he,

Of whom thou spakest but now 1 " " This," he replied,

" Is Provenzano. He is here, because

He reach'd, with grasp presumptuous, at the sway

Of all Sienna. Thus he still hath gone,

Thjiis 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 : " If soul, that to life's verge delays

Repentance, linger in that lower space,

Nor hither mount, (unless good prayers befriend,)

Or ever 2 time, long as it lived, be past ;

How chanced admittance was vouchsafed to him 1 "

"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 3 to redeem his suffering friend,
Who languish'd in the prison-house of Charles ;
Nor, for his sake, refused through every vein
To tremble. More I will not say ; and dark,
I know, my words are ; but thy neighbours soon 4
Shall help thee to a comment on the text.
This is the work, that from these limits freed him."

1 What tumours.] Apt words have power to swage

The tumours of a troubled mind.

Milton's Samson Agonistes.

2 Or ever.] This line was omitted in the former editions, as Mr. Lyell has
pointed out to me.

3 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 person-
ally to supplicate the people of Sienna to contribute the sum required by the
king for his ransom : and this act of self-abasement atoned for his general
ambition and pride. He fell in the battle of Vald 'Elsa, wherein the Floren-
tines discomfited the Siennese in June, 1269. G. Villain relates some curious
particulars of his fate. "Messer Provenzano Salvani, the lord and conductor
of the army, was taken, and his head cut off and carried through all the camp
fixed upon a lance. And well was accomplished the prophecy and revelation
made to him by the Devil by way of witchcraft, but he understood it not ; for
having compelled him to answer how he should succeed in the said engagement,
he told him lyingly : ' Thou shalt go, fight, conquer not, die in the battle, and
thy head shall be the highest in the camp.' And he thought to have the
victory, and from these words thought to remain master of all, and noted not
the fallacy, where he said ' conquer not, die.' And therefore it is great folly
to trust such counsel as that of the Devil." Lib. 7. cap. xxxi.

4 Thy neighbours soon.] "Thou wilt know in the time of thy banishment,
which is near at hand, what it is to solicit favours of others, and ' tremble
through every vein,' lest they should be refused thee."

1—30 PURGATORY, CANTO XII. 221

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 cor-
nice, and are ushered to the next by an angel who points out the way.

With 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 Thymbrsean god,1
With Mars,2 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 wTork he stood,

1 The Thymbrccan god.] Apollo.

Si modo, quern perhibes. pater est Thymbrams Apollo.

Virg. Georg. 4. 323.

2 Mars.] With such a grace,

The giants that attempted to scale heaven,
When they lay dead on the Phlegnean plain,
Mars did appear to Jove.

Beaumont and Fletcher, The Prophetess, act ii. sc. 3.

222 THE VISION. 31—67.

As if bewilder'd, looking on the crowd

Leagued in his proud attempt on Sennaar's plain.1

O Niobe ! in what a trance of woe
Thee I beheld, upon that highway drawn,
Seven sons on either side thee slain. 0 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.

0 fond Arachne ! thee I also saw,
Half spider now, in anguish, crawling up
The unfinish'd web thou weaved'st to thy bane.

0 Eehoboam ! 2 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 Alcmseon 3 forced his mother rate
That ornament, in evil hour received :
How, in the temple, on Sennacherib 4 fell
His sons, and how a corpse they left him there.
Was shown the scath, and cruel mangling made
By Tomyris 5 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 6 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 7
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.

1 noted not (so busied was my thought)

1 Sennaar's plain.'] The builders such of Babel on the plain

Of Sennaar. Milton, P. L. b. 3. 467.

2 0 Reh6boam.~\ 1 Kings, xii. 18.

3 Alcmceon.] Virg. JEn. lib. 6. 445, and Homer, Od. 11. 325.

4 Sennacherib.] 2 Kings, xix. 37.

5 Tomyris.] Caput Cyri amputatum in utrem huniano sanguine repletum
conjici Regina jubet cum hac exprobatione crudelitatis-. Satia te, inquit, san-
guine quem sitisti, cujusque insatiabilis semper fuisti. Justin, lib. 1. cap. viii.

0 Holofernes.] Judith, xiii.

7 What master of the pencil or the style.]

inimitable on earth

By model, or by shading pencil drawn. Milton, P. L. b. 3. 509.

68—105. PURGATORY, Canto XII. 223

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 now for slow suspense. Behold,
That way, an angel hasting towards us. Lo,
Where 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. 0, ye race of men !
Though born to soar, why suffer ye a wind
So slight to baffle ye 1 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,2
(O'er Rubaconte, looking lordly down
On the well-guided city,3) up the right
The impetuous rise is broken by the steps
Carved in that old and simple age, when still
The registry 4 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.

As, entering, there we turn'd, voices, in strain
Ineffable, sang : " Blessed 5 are the poor
In spirit." Ah ! how far unlike to these

1 The sixth handmaid.'] Compare Canto xxii. 116.

2 The chapel stands.] The church of San Miniato in Florence, situated on a
height that overlooks the Arno, where it is crossed by the bridge Rubaconte,
so called from Messer Rubaconte da Mandella, of Milan, chief magistrate of
Florence, by whom the bridge was founded in 1237. See G. Villani, lib. 6.
cap. xxvii.

3 The well-guided city.] This is said ironically of Florence.

4 The registry.] In allusion to certain instances of fraud committed in
Dante's time with respect to the public accounts and measures. See Paradise,
Canto xvi. 103.

5 Blessed.] "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom oi
heaven." Matt. v. 3.

224 THE VISION. 106—129.

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 1 " He in few replied :

"When sin's broad characters,1 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 labour, 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.

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 sackcloth, and having their eyes sewed up
with an iron thread. Amongst these Dante finds Sapia, a Siennese lady,
from whom he learns the cause of her being there.

We 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

1 Sin's broad characters.'] Of the seven P's, that denoted the same number
of sins (Peccata) whereof he was to be cleansed (see Canto ix. 100), the first
had now vanished in consequence of his having past the place where the sin
of pride, the chief of them, was expiated.

7—44. PURGATORY, Canto XIII. 225

The rampart and the path, reflecting nought
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.
" 0 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 x 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 towards 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," 2 so on behind us past,
Those sounds reiterating, nor yet lost
In the faint distance, when another came
Crying, " I am Orestes," 3 and alike
Wing'd its fleet way. " O father ! " I exclaim'd,
" What tongues are these 1 " and as I questional, lo !
A third exclaiming, "Love ye those have wrong'd you."4

" This circuit," said my teacher, " knots the scourge 5
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

1 If.] "Unless there be some urgent necessity for travelling by night, the
daylight should be preferred for that purpose."

2 They have no wine.} John, ii. 3. These words of the Virgin are referred
to as an instance of charity.

3 Ch'estes.] Alluding to his friendship with Pylades.

4 Love ye those have ivrong'd you.] " But I say unto you, Love your
enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray
for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Matt. v. 44.

5 The scourge.] " The chastisement of envy consists in hearing examples of
the opposite virtue, charity. As a curb and restraint on this vice, you will
presently hear very different sounds, those of threatening and punishment."

P

22G THE VISION. 45-86.

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 his 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, meth ought, 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,
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 foil, 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 " 0 shades ! " said I,
"Assured that to your eyes unveil'd shall shine
The lofty light, sole object of your wis]],
So may heaven's grace x 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."

1 So may heaven's grace.'] Se tosto grazia risolva le schiume

Di vostra coscienza, si che chiaro
Per esso scenda della inente il flume.

This is a fine moral, and finely expressed. Unless the conscience be cleared
from its impurity, which it can only thoroughly he by an influence from above,
the mind itself cannot act freely and clearl v. " If ye will do his will, ye shall
know of the doctrine." John, vii. 17.

87—122. PUKGATORY, Canto XIII. 227

" My brother ! we are, each one, citizens
Of one true city.1 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 marked
Expectance. Ask ye how 1 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."

" I 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 2 named,
In sapience I excell'd not ; gladder far
Of other's hurt, than of the good befel me.
That thou mayst own I now deceive thee not,
Hear, if my folly were not as I speak it.
When now my years 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.3
There were they vanquish'd, and betook themselves
Unto the bitter passages of flight.
I niark'd the hunt ; and waxing out of bounds
In gladness, lifted up my shameless brow,
And, like the merlin 4 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,5 touch'd with chaiity,
In his devout oraisons thought on me.
But who art thou that question'.st of our state,
Who go'st, as I believe, with lids unclosed,

1 Citizens

Of one time city.'] "For here Ave have no continuing city, but we seek
one to come." Heb. xiii. 14.

- Sapid.] A lady of Sienna, who living in exile at Colle, was so overjoyed
at a defeat which her countrymen sustained near that place, that she declared
nothing more was wanting to make her die contented. The Latin annotator
on the Monte Casino MS. says of this lady : " fait uxor D. Cinii de Pigezo de
Senis."

3 And I pray'd God to grant what He had tvill'd.] That her countrymen
should be defeated in battle.

4 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
oppressed by the rigour of the season.

c" The hermit Piero.] Piero Pettinagno, a holy hermit of Florence.

228 THE VISION. 123—145.

#

And breatliest 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 x
Urges my soul with more exceeding dread.
That nether load already weighs me down."

She thus : " Who then, amongst us here aloft,
Hath brought thee, if thou weenest to return ? "

" He," answered I, " who standeth mute beside me.
I 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 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
E'er tread on Tuscan soil, thou save my fame
- Amongst my kindred. Them shalt thou behold
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 3
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
Brettiuoro, and Riuieri da Calboli of Romagna ; the latter of whom, hear-
iug that he comes from the banks of the Arno, inveighs against the de-
generacy of all those who dwell in the cities visited by that stream ; and

1 The icoe 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 con-
cluded of a mind such as his.

2 That vain multittide.] The Siennese. See Hell, c. xxix. 118. "Their
acquisition of Telamone, a seaport on the confines of the Maremma, has led
them to conceive hopes of becoming a naval power: but this scheme will
prove as chimerical as their former plan for the discovery of a subterraneous
stream under their city." Why they gave the appellation of Diana to the
imagined stream, Venturi says he leaves it to the antiquaries of Sienna to
conjecture.

3 They, who lead.] The Latin note to the Monte Casino MS. informs us,
that those who were to command the fleets of the Siennese, in the event of
their becoming a naval power, lost their lives during their employment at
Telamone, through the pestilent air of the Maremma, which lies near that
place.

1-31. PURGATORY, Canto XIV. 229

the former, in like manner, against the inhabitants of Romagna. On
leaving these, our Poets hear voices recording noted instances of envy.

"Say,1 who is he around our mountain winds,
Or ever death lias pruned his wing for flight ;
That opes his eyes, and covers them at will ?

" I 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 2 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 3 began : " 0 soul, who yet
Pent in the body, tendest towards the sky !
For charity, we pray thee, comfort us ;
Recounting whence thou comest, and who thou art :
For thou dost make us, at the favour shown thee,
Marvel, as at a thing that ne'er hath been."

" There stretches through the midst of Tuscany,"
I straight began, " a brooklet,4 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.
To tell you who I am were words mis-spent :
For yet my name scarce sounds on rumour's lip."

" If 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 : 5 " Why hath he conceal'd
The title of that river, as a man
Doth of some horrible thing1?" The spirit, who
Thereof was questional, did acquit him thus :
" I know not : but 'tis fitting well the name

1 Sai/.] The two spirits who thus speak to each other are, Guido del Duca
of Brettinoro, and Rinieri da Calboli of Romagna.

2 Accost him.] It is worthy of remark, that the Latin annotator on the
Monte Casino MS. agrees with Landino in reading "a colo," instead of
" accolo," and interprets it as he does : " Nil aliud vult auctor dicere de colo,
nisi quod cum interroget ita dulciter ut respondeat (sic) eum ad colum, id est
quod tantum respondeat auctor eis quod animus eorum remaneat in quiete et
non in suspense" " The author means to say, that the spirit should interro-
gate him courteously, that he may return such an answer as shall put a period
to their suspense." Still I have retained my translation of the common
reading generally supposed to be put by syncope for "accoglilo," "accost
him."

3 The one."] Guido del Duca.

4 A brooklet.'] The Arno, that rises in Falterona, a mountain in the
A pennine. Its course is a hundred and twenty miles, according to G. Villani,
who traces it accurately.

5 The other.] Rinieri da Calboli.

230 THE VISION. S2— (Jl,

Should perisli of that vale ; for from the source,1

Where teems so plenteously the Alpine steep

Maim'd of Pelorus,2 (that doth scarcely pass 3

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 'twere 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 transformed, it seems as they

Had shared of Circe's feeding. 'Midst brute swine,4

Worthier of acorns than of other food

Created for man's use, he shapeth first

His obscure way ; then, sloping onward, finds

Curs,5 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 G

Swells out to largeness, e'en so much it finds

Dogs turning into wolves.7 Descending still

Through yet more hollow eddies, next he meets

A race of foxes,8 so replete with craft,

They do not fear that skill can master it.

Nor will I cease because my words are heard9

By other ears than thine. It shall be well

For this man,10 if he keep in memory

What from no erring spirit I reveal.

Lo ! I behold thy grandson,11 that becomes

1 From the source.'] "From the rise of the Arno in that 'Alpine steep,'
the Apennine, from whence Pelorus in Sicily was torn by a convulsion of the
earth, even to the point where the same river unites its waters to the ocean,
Virtue is persecuted by all."

2 Maim'd of Pelorus.'] Virg. uEn. lib. 3. 414. Lucan, Phars. lib. 2. 438.

■ A hill

Torn from Pelorus. Milton, P. L. b. 1. 232.

3 That doth scarcely pass.] "Pelorus is in few places higher than Fal-
terona, where the Arno springs." Lombardi explains this differently, and, I
think, erroneously.

4 'Midst brute stoine.] The people of Casentino.

5 Curs.] The Arno leaves Arezzo about four miles to the left.

6 Foss.] So in his anger he terms the Arno.

7 Wolves.] The Florentines.

8 Foxes.] The Pisans.

9 My words are heard.] It should be recollected that Guido still addresses
himself to Rinieri.

10 For this man.] " For Dante, who has told us that he comes from the
banks of Arno."

11 Thy grandson.] Fuleieri da Calboli, grandson of Rinieri da Calboli who
is here spoken to. The atrocities predicted came to pass in 1302. See G.
Villani, lib. 8. cap. lix.

02—90. PURGATORY, Canto XIV. 231

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, soon 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 x 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 2 thy heart where there doth need
Exclusion of participants in good %
This is Rinieri's spirit ; this, the boast
And honour of the house of Calboli ;
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)3
Of all that truth or fancy 4 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 ? 5 where

«

1 What thou wilt not do.] Dante having declined telling him his name. See
v. 22.

2 Why place.] This will be explained in the ensuing Canto.

3 'Twixt Po, the mount, the Reno, and the shore.] The boundaries of
Romagna.

4 Fancy.] "Trastullo." Quadrio, in the notes on the second of the Salmi
Penitenziali of our author, understands this in a higher sense, as meaning
that joy which results from an easy and constant practice of virtue. See
<)]>ere di Dante, Zatta ediz. toni. iv. part ii. p. 193. And he is followed by
Lombardi.

5 Lizio.] Lizio da Valbona, introduced into Boccaccio's Decameron, G. v.
N. 4.

232 THE VISION. 100—111.

Manardi, Traversaro, and Carpigna ?

O bastard slips of old Komagna's line !

When in Bologna the low artisan,2

And in Faenza yon Bernardin 3 sprouts,

A gentle cyon from ignoble stem.

Wonder not, Tuscan, if thou see me weep,

When I recal to mind those once loved names,

Guido of Prata,4 and of Azzo him 5

That dwelt with us ; 6 Tignoso 7 and his troop,

With Traversaro's house and Anastagio's,8

(Each race disherited ;) and beside these,

The ladies 9 and the knights, the toils and ease,

1 Manardi, Traversaro, and Carpigna."] Arrigo Manardi of Faenza, or, as
some say, of Brettinoro ; Pier Traversaro, lord of Ravenna ; and Guido di
Carpigna of Montefeltro.

2 In Bologna the low artisan.] One who had been a mechanic, named
Lambertaccio, arrived at almost supreme power in Bologna.

Quando in Bologna un Fabro si ralligna :
Quando in Faenza un Bernardin di Fosco.

The pointing and the marginal note of the Monte Casino MS. entirely change
the sense of these two lines. There is a mark of interrogation added to each ;
and by way of answer to both there is written, "Quasi dicat numquam."
Fabro is made a proper name, and it is said of him : " Iste fuit Dom. Faber de
Lambertaciis de Bononia;" and Benvenuto da Imola calls him " Nobilis
Miles." I have not ventured to alter the translation so as to make it accord
with this interpretation, as it must have been done in the face, I believe, of
nearly all the editions, and, as far as may be gathered from the silence of
Lombardi, of the MSS. also which that commentator had consulted. But
those who wish to see more on the subject, are referred to Monti's Proposta,
torn. iii. pto 2, under the word " Rallignare."

3 Yon Bernardin.] Bernardin di Fosco, a man of low origin, but great
t dents, who governed at Faenza.

4 Prata.] A place between Faenza and Ravenna.

5 Of Azzo him.] Ugolino, of the Ubaldini family in Tuscany.

6 With ns.] Lombardi claims the reading, "nosco," instead of "vosco,"
" with us," instead of " with you," for his favourite edition ; but it is also in
Landino's of 1488.

7 Tignoso.] Federigo Tignoso of Rimini.

8 Traversaro's house and Anastagio's.] Two noble families of Ravenna.
See v. 100. She, to whom Dryden has given the name of Honoria, in the fable
so admirably paraphrased from Boccaccio, was of the former : her lover and
the spectre were of the Anastagi family. See Canto xxviii. 20.

9 The ladies, etc.] Le donne, e i cavalier, gli affanni, e gli agi

Che ne 'nvogliava amore e cortesia.

These two lines express the true spirit of chivalry. " Agi " is understood, by
the commentators whom I have consulted, to mean "the ease procured for
others by the exertions of knight-errantry." But surely it signifies the
alternation of ease with labour. Venturi is of opinion that the opening of the
Orlando Furioso —

Le donne, i cavalier, l'arme, gli amori,

Le cortesie, l'audaci imprese io canto,

originates in this passage.

11 2—124. PURGATORY, Canto XIV. 233

That witch'd us into love and courtesy ; 1

Where now such malice reigns in recreant hearts.

O Brettinoro ! 2 wherefore tamest 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 ; 3 Castracaro ill,

And Conio worse,4 who care to propagate

A race of Counties 5 from such blood as theirs.

Well shall ye also do, Pagani,0 then

When from amongst you hies your demon child :

Not so, howe'er,7 that henceforth there remain

True proof of what ye were. 0 Hugolin,8

1 Courtesy.] " Cortesia e onestade," etc. Convito, p. 65. " Courtesy and
honour are all one ; and because anciently virtue and good manners were
usual in courts, as the contrary now is, this term was derived from thence :
courtesy was as much as to say, custom of courts ; which word, if it were now
taken from courts, especially those of Italy, would be no other than turpitude,"
"turpezza."

Courtesy,

Which oft is sooner found in lowly sheds

With smoky rafters, than in tapstry halls

And courts of princes, where it first was named,

And yet is most pretended. Milton, Comus.

Marino has exceeded his usual extravagance in Ins play on this word :
Ma come puo vero diletto ? 6 come
Vera quiete altrui donar la Corte ?
Le die la Cortesia del proprio nome
Solo il principio, il fine ha della Morte.

Adone, c. ix. st. 77.

2 0 Brettinoro.] A beautifully situated 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 amongst them,
contended 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
fathers of families among them, a ring being assigned to each, and that
accordingly as a stranger on his arrival hung his horse's bridle on one or other
of these, he became his guest to whom the ring belonged.

3 Bagnacavallo.'] A castle between Imola and Ravenna.
4 Castracaro ill,

And Conio worse.] Both in Romagna.

5 Counties.] I have used this word here for " Counts," as it is in Shakspeare.

6 Pagani.] The Pagani were lords of Faenza and Imola. One of them,
Machinardo, was named the Demon, from his treachery. See Hell, Canto
xxvii. 47, and note.

7 Not so, hoice'er.] "Yet your offspring will be stained with some vice, and
will not afford true proof of the worth of your ancestors."

8 Hugolin.] Ugolino Ubaldini, a noble and virtuous person in Faenza, who,
on account of his age probably, was not likely to leave any offspring behind
him. He is enumerated among the poets by Crescimbeni, and by Tiraboschi,
Mr. Mathias's edit. vol. i. p. 143 ; and Perticari cites a beautiful little poem
by him in the Apologia di Dante, parte ii. c. 27, but with so little appearance
of antiquity that nothing less than the^assurance of so able a critic could induce
one for a moment to receive it as genuine.

234 THE VISION. 125-153.

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 1 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 lightening, when it rives the air,
Met us, and shouted, " Whosoever finds
Will slay me ; " 2 then fled from us, as the holt
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 quick-following thunder : " Mark in me
Aglauros,3 turn'd to rock." I, at the sound
Retreating, drew more closely to my guide.

Now in mute stilness rested all the air ;
And thus he spake : " There was the galling Lit,4
Which5 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 call. Heaven calls,6
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."

1 Such.] Here again the Nidobeatina edition adopted by Lombardi, and
the Monte Casino MS. differ from the common reading, and both have

Si m' ha nostra region la mente stretta.
Our country's sorrow has so wrung my heart,
instead of

Si m' ha vostra ragion, etc.

2 Whosoever finds

Will slay me.~\ The words of Cain, Gen. iv. 14.

3 Aglauros.] Ovid, Met. lib. 2. fab. 12.

4 There was the galling bit.] Referring to wh.it had been befoi'e said, Canto
xiii. 35. The commentators remark the unusual word " camo," which occurs
here in the original ; but they have not observed, I believe, that Dante himself
uses it in the J)e Monarchid, lib. 3. p. 155. For the Greek word x*Pov see a
fragment by S. Petrus Alex, in Routh's Reliquim Sacra;, vol. iii. p. 342, and
note.

5 Which.^ Mr. Darley has noticed the omission of this line in the former
editions.

c Heaven calls.] Or ti solleva a piu beata speme,

Mirando il ciel, che ti si volve intorno

Immortal ed adorno. Petrarca, Canzone, I 'co pensando.

1—19. PURGATORY, Canto XV £35

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.

As much ' as 'twixt the third hour's close and dawn,

Appeareth of heaven's sphere, that ever whirls

As restless as an infant in his play ;

So much appeared remaining to the sun

Of his slope journey towards the western goal.

Evening was there, and here the moon of night ;
And full upon our forehead smote the beams.
For round the mountain, circling, so our path •

Had led us, that toward the sunset now
Direct we journey 'd ; when I felt a weight
Of more exceeding splendour, than before,
Press on my front. The cause unknown, amaze
Possess'd me ! and both hands 2 against my brows
Lifting, I interposed them, as a screen,
That of its gorgeous superilux of light
Clips the diminisli'd orb. As when the ray,3
Striking on water or the surface clear
Of mirror, leaps unto the opposite part,
Ascending at a glance,4 e'en as it fell,

1 As much.] It wanted three hours of sunset.

2 Both hands.] Raising his hand to save the dazzled sense.

Southey's Thalaba, b. 12.

3 As when the ray.]

Sicut aqua? tremulum labris ubi lumen aenis
Sole repercussum, aut radiantis imagine lunse,
Omnia pervolitat late loca, jamque sub auras
Erigitur, summique ferit laquearia tecti. JEn. lib. 8. 25.

Compare Apoll. Rhodius, iii. 755.

4 Ascending at a glance.]

Quod simul ac primum sub divo splendor aquai
Ponitur : extemplo, coelo stellante, serena
Sidera respondent in aqua radiantia mundi.
Jamne vides igitur, quam parvo tempore imago
^Etheris ex oris ad terrarum accidat oras.

Lucret. lib. 4. 215.

236 THE VISION. 20—56.

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 1 "
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
Up to their pitch." The blessed angel, soon
As we had reach'd him, hail'd 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,"2 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 Eomagna's spirit,3 when he spake
Of bliss exclusive, with no partner shared 1 "

He straight replied : " No wonder, since he knows
What sorrow waits on his own worse 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,4 by how much more they call it ours,
So much propriety of each in good
Encreases more, and heighten'd charity
Wraps that fair cloister in a brighter flame.

1 And as much.'] Lombardi, I think justly, observes that this does not refer
to the length of time which a stone is in falling to the ground, but to the per-
pendicular line which it describes when falling, as contrasted with the angle of
incidence formed by light reflected from water or from a mirror.

2 Blessed the 7tiercifnl.] Matt. v. 7.

3 Romagna's spirit.] Guido del Duca, of Brettinoro, whom we have seen in
the preceding Canto.

4 For there.] Landino has here cited, in addition to Seneca and Boetius, the
two following apposite passages from Augustine and Saint Gregory : " Nullo
modo fit minor accedente consortio possessio bonitatis, quam tanto latins quanto
concordius individua sociorum possidet caritas." Augustin. de Civitate Dei.
"Qui facibus invidiam carere desiderat, illam possessionem appetat, quam
numerus possidentium non angustat."

57—99. PURGATORY, Canto XV. 237

" Now lack I satisfaction more," said I,
* Than if thou hadst been silent at the first ;
And doubt more gathers on my labouring thought.
How can it chance, that good distributed,
The many, that possess it, makes more rich,
Than if 'twere shared by few 1 " 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 ardour as it finds.
The sempiternal effluence streams abroad,
Spreading, wherever charity extends.
So that the more aspirants to that bliss
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,1
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 extatic vision wrapt away ;
And in a temple saw, methought, a crowd
Of many persons ; and at the entrance stood
A dame,2 whose sweet demeanour 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 :
" If thou, Pisistratus, be lord indeed
Over this city,3 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 ; " and to her, meseem'd,

1 Provide but thou.'] "Take heed that thou be healed of the five remaining
sins, as thou already art of the two, namely, pride and envy."

2 A dame.] Luke, ii. 48.

3 Over this city.] Athens, named after 'AOfot), Minerva, in consequence of
her having produced a more valuable gift for it in the olive, than Neptune had
done in the horse.

238 THE VISION. 100-143.

Benign and meek, with visage undisturb'd,

Her sovran spake : " How shall we those requite J

Who wish us evil, if we thus condemn %

The man that loves us 1 " After that I saw

A multitude, in fury burning, slay

With stones a stripling youth,2 and shout amain

"Destroy, destroy ;" and him I saw, who bow'd

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 travel'd witli closed eyes and tottering gait,
Like to a man by wine or sleep o'ercharged 1 ;'

" 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 tli us : " Not if thy countenance were ruask'd
With hundred vizards, 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 vigour 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
Gathering, a fog made towards us, dark as night.

here was no room for 'scaping ; and that mist
Bereft us, both of sight and the pure air.

1 Hon 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 daughter, had snatched a kiss from her in
public. The story is told by Valerius Maximus, lib. 5. i.

2 A stripling youth.'] The protomartyr Stephen.

1 -3G. PURGATORY, Canto XVI. 230

CANTO XVL
gtrgamewt

As they proceed through ftie mist, they hear the voices of spirits praying.
Marco Lombardo, one of these, points out to Dante the error of such as
impute our actions to necessity ; explains to him that man is endued with
free will ; and shows that much of human depravity results from the un
due mixture of spiritual and temporal authority in rulers.

Hell's dunnest gloom, or night imlustrous, dark,
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 choir,
One voice, one measure ran, that perfect seem'd
The concord of their song. " Are these I hear
Spirits, 0 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 speak'st of us, as thou 1 thyself e'en yet
Dividedst time by calends ? " So one voice
Bespake me ; whence my master said, " Reply ;
And ask, if upward hence the passage lead."

" 0 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
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

As thou,] " As if thou wert still living."

240 THE VISION. 37—70.

To higher regions ; and am hither come
Thorough 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 : x
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 2 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 ;
And thou in truth comest from it. Ye, who live,
Do so each cause refer to heaven above,
E'en as its motion, of necessity,
Drew with it all that moves. If this were so,3

1 / was of Lonibardy, and Marco call'd.] A Venetian gentleman. "Lom-
bardo," both was his sirname and denoted the country to which he belonged.
G. Villani, lib. 7. 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 Ric-
cardo da Camino, lord of Trevigi, for relief. Riccardo set on foot a contribu-
tion among several nobles of Lombardy for the purpose ; of which when Marco
was informed, he wrote back with much indignation 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. Of this
generous man I have occasion to speak again in the Notes to Canto viii. 71,
and to Par. Canto ix. 48.

2 Elsewhere. ] He refers to what Guido del Duca had said in the fourteenth
Canto, concerning the degeneracy of his countrymen.

3 If this were so.] Mr. Crowe, in his Lewesdon Hill, has expressed similar
sentiments with much energy :

71—95. PURGATORY, Canto XVI. 241

Free choice in you were none ; nor justice would
There should be joy for virtue, 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,1
• 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,2
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 flavour soon she tastes ; and, snared by that,
With fondness she pursues it ; if no guide

Of this be sure,

Where freedom is not, there no virtue is :
If there be none, this world is all a cheat,
And the divine stability of heaven
(That assured seat for good men after death)
Is but a transient cloud, display'd so fair
To cherish virtuous hope, but at our need
Eludes the sense, and fools our honest faith
Vanishing in a lie, etc.

So, also, Frezzi, in his Quadriregio :

Or sappi ben che Dio ha dato il freno
A voi di voi ; e, se non fosse questo,
Libero arbitrio in voi sarebbe meno. Lib. 2. cap. i.

There is much more on this subject at the conclusion of the eighth Capitolo
of this book. Compare also Origen. in Genesin. Patrum Grcecor. vol. xi. p.
14, Werceburgi, 1783, 8vo ; and Tertullian, Contra Marcionem, lib. 2. p. 458,
Lutetiae, 1641, fol. A very noble passage on the freedom of the will occurs
in the first book Be Monarchid, beginning, " Et humanum genus, potissimum
liberum, optime se habet." "The human race, when most completely free,
is in its highest state of excellence."

1 To mightier force.] " Though ye are subject to a higher power than that
of the heavenly constellations, even to the power of the great Creator himself,
yet ye are still left in the possession of liberty."

2 Like a babe, that wantons sportively.'] This reminds us of the Emperor
Hadrian's verses to his departing soul :

Animula vagula blandula, etc.

242 THE VISION. 96—123.

Recal, no rein direct her wandering course.

Hence it behoved, the law should be a curb ;

A sovereign hence behoved, whose piercing view

Might mark at least the fortress x and main tower

Of the true city. Laws indeed there are :

But who is he observes them 1 None ; not he,

Who goes before, the shepherd of the flock,

Who2 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 two suns,3 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,

Eacli must perforce decline to worse, una wed

By fear of other. If thou doubt me, mark

The blade : each herb is judged of by its seed.

That land,4 through which Adice and the Po

Their waters roll, was once the residence

Of courtesy and valour, ere the day 5

That frown'd on Frederick ; now secure may pass

Those limits, whosoe'er hath left, for shame,

To talk with good men, or come near their haunts.

Three aged ones are still found there, in whom

1 T/ic fortress.] Justice, the most necessary 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 l)e Monarchic, concerning the authority
of the temporal Monarch and concerning Justice, that they are right. Yet
Lombardi understands the law here spoken of to be the law of God ; the
sovereign, a spiritual ruler, and the true city, the society of true believers ; so
that the fortress, according to him, denotes the principal parts of Christian
duty.

2 JFAo.] 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 dividetli not the hoof;
he is unclean unto you." Levit. xi. 4.

3 Tico suits.] The Emperor and the Bishop of Rome. There is something
similar to this in the De Monarchid, lib. 3. p. 138. "They say first, accord-
ing to that text in Genesis, that God made two great lights, the greater light
and the lesser^ the one to rule the day, and the other the night ; then, that as
the moon, winch is the lesser light, has no brightness, except as she receives it
from the sun, so neither has the temporal kingdom authority, except what it
receives from the spiritual government." The fallacy of which rea oning (if
such it can be called) he proceeds to prove.

4 That land.] Lombardy.

5 Ere the day.] Before the Emperor Frederick II. was defeated before
Parma, in 1248. G. Villani, lib. 6. cap. xxxv.

124—144. PURGATORY, Canto XVI. 243

The old time x chicles the new : these deem it long

Ere God restore them to a better world :

The good Gherardo ; ■ of Palazzo he,

Conrad ; 3 and Guido of Castello,4 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,5

And there herself and burden much defiled."

" O 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 Gai'a °

1 The old time.] L'antica eta.

It is silly sooth,

And dallies with the innocence of love,

Like the old age. Shakspeare, Twelfth Night, act ii. sc. 4.

2 The good Gherardo.'] Gherardo da Camino, of Trevigi. He is honourably
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 grandfather 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." Tiraboschi
supposes him to have been the same Gherardo with whom the Provencal poets
wire used to meet a hospitable reception. " This is probably that same
Gherardo, who, together with his sons, so early as before the year 1254, gave a
kind and hospitable reception to the Provencal poets." Mr. Mathias's edition,
torn. i. p. 137.

3 Conrad.] Currado da Palazzo, a gentleman of Brescia.

4 Guido of Castello.] Of Reggio. All the Italians were called Lombards by
the French.

5 Fallen into the mire.] There is a passage resembling this in the De Vulg.
Eloq. lib. 2. cap. iv. : "Ante omnia ergo dicimus unumquemque debere
materia? pondus propriis humeris excipere a?quale, ne forte humerorum nimio
gravatam virtutem in coenum cespitare necesse sit."

6 His daughter Gala.] A lady equally admired for her modesty, the beauty
of her person, and the excellency of her talents. Gai'a, says Tirabosohi, may
perhaps lay claim to the praise of having been the first among the Italian
ladies, by whom the vernacular poetry was cultivated. This appears (although
no one has yet named her as a poetess) from the MS. Commentary on the
Commedia of Dante, by Giovanni da Serravalle, afterwards bishop of Fermo,
where, commenting on Canto xvi. of the Purgatory, he says: "De ista Gaja
filia dicti boni Gerardi, possent dici multoe laudes, quia fuit prudens domina,
literata, magni consilii, et magna? pradentia?, maxima? pulchritudinis, qucc
scivit bene loqui rhytmatice in vulgari."

244 THE VISION. 145—149.

#

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 vapour ; and soon after his fancy represents
to him in lively portraiture some noted examples of anger. This imagina-
tion is dissipated by the appearance of an angel, who marshals them on-
ward 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.

Call to remembrance, reader, if thou e'er

Hast on an Alpine height x been ta'en by cloud,

Through which thou saw'st no better than the mole

Doth through opacous membrane ; then, whene'er

The watery vapours dense began to melt

Into thin air, how faintly the sun's sphere

Seem'd wading through them : so thy nimble thought

May image, how at first 1 rebeheld

The sun, that bedward now his couch o'erhung.

Thus, with my leader's feet still equaling 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 ;

1 On an Alpine height.] " Nell' alpe." Although the Alps, as Landino
remarks, are properly those mountains which divide Italy from France, yet
from them all high mountains are in the Tuscan language, though not in the
Latin, termed Alps. Mdton uses the word thus generally in the Samson
Agonistes :

Nor breath of vernal air from snowy Alp. »

And this is a sufficient answer to the charge of impropriety, which is brought
by Doctor Johnson, on the introduction of it into that drama. See The
Rambler, No. 140.

18-31. PURGATORY, Canto XVII. 245

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 : 1 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,2 whose visage spake

Fell rancour, malice deep, wherein he died ;

And round him 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,3 when the water fails

That fed it ; in my vision straight uprose

A damsel 4 weeping loud, and cried, " 0 queen !

1 The bird, that most

Delights itself in song.'] I cannot think with Vellutello, that the swallovr
is here meant. Dante probably alludes to the story of Philomela, as it is
found in Homer's Odyssey, b. 19. 518, 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 nightingale." Cowper's note on this passage.

In speaking of the nightingale, let me observe, that while some have considered
its song as a melancholy, and others as a cheerful one, Chiabrera appears to
have come nearest the truth, when he says, in the Alcippo, act i. sc. 1 :

Non mai si stanca d'iterar le note,

0 gioconde o dogliose,

Al sentir dilettose.

Unwearied still reiterates her lays,

Jocund or sad, delightful to the ear.

See a very pleasing letter on this subject by a late illustrious statesman :
Address to the reader prefixed to Fox's History of James II. edit. 1808, p.
xii. ; and a beautiful poem by Mr. Coleridge. I know not whether the
following lines by a neglected poet have yet been noticed, as showing the
diversity of opinions that have prevailed respecting the song of this bird :

The cheerful birds

With sweetest notes to sing their Maker's praise,

Among the which, the merrie nightingale

With swete and swete, her breast against a thorn,

Hinges out all night. Vallans, Tale of Two Sivannes.

2 One crucified.'] Haman. See the book of Esther, chap. vii. " In the
Lunetta of Haman, we owe the sublime conception of his figure (by Michael
Angelo) to this passage. Fuseli, Lecture iii. note.

3 Like a bubble.] The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,

And these are of them.

Shakspeare, Macbeth, act i. sc. 3.

4 A damsel.] Lavinia, mourning for her mother Amata, who, impelled by
grief and indignation for the supposed death of Turnus, destroyed herself.
.En. lib. 12. 595.

246 THE VISION. 35-76.

0 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. I am she, whose tears
Mourn, ere I fall, a mother's timeless end."

E'en as a sleep breaks off, if suddenly
New radiance strike upon the closed lids,
The broken slumber quivering ere it dies ; x
Thus, from before me, sunk that 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

1 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 chuse 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 'twere the waving of a wing,

That fann'd my face, and whisper'd : " Blessed they,

The peace- makers : 2 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, 0 my strength 1 "
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.

1 The broken slumber quivering ere it dies."] Venturi suggests that this hold
and unusual metaphor may have been formed on that in Virgil :

Tempus erat quo prima quies mortalibus segris

Incipit, et dono divum gratissima serpit. jEn. lib. 2. 268.

2 The peace-maker s.~\ "Blessed are the peace-makers; for they shall be
called the children of God." Matt. v. 9.

77—109. PURGATORY, Canto XVII. 247

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 to me : " The love * of good, whate'er
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,2 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 through excess
Of vigour, or defect. While e'er it seeks*
The primal blessings,4 or with measure due
The inferior,5 no delight, that flows from it,
Partakes of ill. But let it warp to evil,
Or with more ardour 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 each act no less, that merits pain.
Now 6 since it may not be, but love intend
The welfare mainly of the thing it loves,
All from self-hatred are secure ; and since
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.

1 The love.] " A defect in our love towards God, or lukewarmness in piety,
is here removed."

2 Or natural.] Lombardi refers to the Convito, Canz. i. Tratt. 2. cap. hi.,
where this subject is diffusely treated by our Poet.

3 While e'er it seeks.] So Frezzi :

E s'egli e ben, che d'altro ben dipenda,
Non s'ami quasi per se esistente,
Se vuoi, che quando e tolto, non t'ofFenda.

II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. xiv.

This Capitolo, which describes the punishment of those who give way to inor-
dinate grief for the loss of their kindred, is marked by much power of imagina-
tion and a sublime morality.

4 The primal blessings.] Spiritual good.

5 The inferior.] Temporal good.

6 Nmo.] " It is impossible for any being, either to hate itself, or to hate
the First Cause of all, by which it exists. We can therefore only rejoice in
the evil which befals others."

248 - THE VISION. ' 110—137

Three ways such love is gender'd in your clay.
There is l who hopes (his neighbour's worth deprest)
Pre-eminence himself ; and covets hence,
For his own greatness, that another fall.
There is 2 who so much fears the loss of power,
Fame, favour, glory, (should his fellow mount
Above him,) and so sickens at the thought,
He loves their opposite : and there is he,3
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.4 Of the other sort
Be now instructed ; that which follows good,
But with disordered and irregular course.

" All indistinctly apprehend a bliss,
On which the soul may rest ; the hearts of all
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 5 over us, is mourn'd.
Account of that division tripartite
Expect not, fitter for thine own research."

T There is.] The proud.

2 There is.] The envious.

3 There is he.] The resentful.

4 This threefold love is mourn'd.] Frezzi alludes to this distinction :

Superbia puote essere in tre modi ;
Si come si dimostra dalla Musa,
La qual hai letta, e che tu tanto lodi.

II Qiiadrir. lib. 3. cap. ii.

5 Along three circles.] According to the allegorical commentators, as Ven-
turi has observed, Reason is represented under the person of Virgil, and Sense
under that of Dante. The former leaves to the latter to discover for itself the
three carnal sins — avarice, gluttony, and libidinousness ; having already-
declared the nature of the spiritual sins — pride, envy, anger, and indifference,
or lukewarmness in piety, which the Italians call accidia, from the Greek
word ixfjitx, and which Chaucer vainly endeavoured to naturalize in our
language. See the Persone's Tale. Lombardi refers to Thomas Aquinas,
lib. 1. Quest, lxxii. Art. ii., for the division here made by our Poet.

1—26. PURGATORY, Canto XVIII. 249

CANTO XVIII.

gtrfl amen!

Virgil discourses further concerning the nature of love. Then a multitude of
spirits rush by ; two of whom in van of the rest, record instances of zeal
and fervent affection, and another, who was abbot of San Zeno in Verona,
declares himself to Virgil and Dante ; and lastly follow other spirits,
shouting fortli memorable examples of the sin for which they suffer. The
Poet, pursuing his meditations, falls into a dreamy slumber.

The teacher ended,1 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 lie, true father, mark'd the secret wish

By diffidence restrain'd ; and, speaking, gave

Me boldness thus to speak : " Master ! my sight

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

Aught pleasing prompts her, soon as she is waked

By pleasure into act. Of substance true

Your apprehension 2 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,

1 The teacher ended.'] Compare Plato, Protagoras, vol. iii. p. 123, Bip. edit. :
U^aiTxyo^Ki p\y ToffaZrct x.. t. a. ; Apoll. Rhod. lib. i. 513 ; and Milton, P. L.
b. 8. 1 :

The angel ended, and in Adam's ear

So charming left his voice, that he awhile

Thought him still speaking, still stood fix'd to hear.

2 Your apprehension.'] It is literally, "Your apprehensive faculty derives
intension from a thing really existing, and displays that intension within you,
so that it makes the soul turn to it." The commentators labour in explaining
this ; but whatever sense they have elicited, may, I think, be resolved into the
words of the translation in the text.

250 THE VISION. 27-57.

And a new nature knit by pleasure in ye.
Then, as the fire points up, and mounting seeks
His birthplace ami 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
Praise- worthy in itself ; although perhaps x
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 !
And my own docile 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 lies beyond, expect
From Beatrice, faith not reason's task.
Spirit,2 substantial form, with matter join'd,
Not in confusion mix'd, hath in itself
Specific virtue of that union born,
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.

1 Perhaps.] " Our author," Venturi observes, " uses the language of the
Peripatetics, which denominates the kind of things, as determinable by many
differences, matter. Love then, in kind perhaps, appears good ; and it is said
perhaps, because, strictly speaking, in kind there is neither good nor bad,
neither praiseworthy nor blameable." To this Lombavdi adds, that what
immediately follows, namely, that "every mark is not good although the wax
be so," answers to this interpretation. For the wax is precisely as the deter-
minable matter, and the mark or impression as the determining form ; and
even as the wax, which is either good or at least not bad, may, by being im-
printed by a bad figure, acquire the name of bad ; so may love be said
generally to be good or at least not bad, and acquire the name of bad by being
determined to an unfit object. " As the wax takes all shapes, and yet is wax
still at the bottom ; the to vtoku/aivov still is wax ; so the soul transported in
so many several passions of joy, fear, hope, sorrow, anger, and the like, has for
its general groundwork of all tins, Love." Henry More, Discourse xvi. This
passage in the most philosophical of our theologians, may serve for an answer
to the objection of those who blame Collins for not having brought in Love
among the " Passions " in his exquisite ode.

2 Spirit.] The human soul, which differs from that of brutes, inasmuch as
though united with the body it has a separate existence of its own.

58— 80. PURGATORY, Canto XVIII. 251

But o'er each lower faculty supreme,

That, as she list, are summon'd to her bar,

Ye have that virtue x 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 ;

E'en as the affections, good or ill, she takes,

Or severs,2 winnow' d as the chaff. Those men,3

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 love that glows within you ; to dismiss

Or harbour it, the power is in yourselves.

Remember, Beatrice, in her style,

Denominates free choice by eminence

The noble virtue ; if in talk with thee

She touch upon that theme." The moon, well nigh

To midnight hour belated, made the stars

Appear to wink and fade ; and her broad disk

Seem'd like a crag 4 on fire, as up the vault 5

That course she journey'd, which the sun then warm

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 lightened by the aid of that clear spirit,

Who raiseth Andes 6 above Mantua's name.

I therefore, when my questions had obtain'd

Solution plain and ample, stood as one

1 That virtue.] Reason.

2 Or severs.] Lest the reader of the original should be misled, it is right to
warn him that the word " vigliare " must not be confounded with " vagliare," to
winnow, and strictly means "to separate from the straw what remains of the
grain after the threshing." The process is distinctly described in the Notes on
the Decameron, p. 77, Ediz. Giunti, 1573, where this passage is referred to.

3 Those men.] The great moral philosophers among the heathens.

4 A crag.] I have preferred the reading of Landino, scheggion, "crag,"
conceiving it to be more poetical than secchion, "bucket," which is the common
reading. The same cause, the vapours, which the commentators say might
give the appearance of increased magnitude to the moon, might also make her
seem broken at her rise. Lombardi explains it differently. The moon being,
as he says, in the fifth night of her wane, has exactly the figure of a brazen
bucket, round at the bottom and open at top ; and, if we suppose it to be all
on fire, we shall have, besides the form of the moon, her colour also. There is
a simile in one of Fielding's novels very like this, but so ludicrous that I am
unwilling to disturb the reader's gravity by inserting it.

5 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 set between the isles of Corsica and
Sardinia.

fi A ndes.] Andes, now Pietola, made more famous than Mantua, near which
it is situated, by having been the birthplace of Virgil.

252 THE VISION. 87—124.

Musing in dreamy slumber ; but not long
Slumber'd ; for suddenly a multitude,
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,1 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 2 sought with haste
The hilly region. Ca3sar,3 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."

" 0 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 shaft 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 4 of San Zeno, when the hand
Of Barbarossa grasp'd Imperial sway,
That name ne'er utter'd without tears in Milan.
And there is he,5 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,

1 Ismenus and Asopus.] Rivers near Thebes.

2 Mary.] "And Mary arose in those days, and went into the hill-country
with haste, into a city of Judah ; and entered into the house of Zacharias, and
saluted Elisabeth." Luke, i. 39, 40.

3 Ccesar.] See Lucan, Phars. lib. 3. and 4., and Caesar, Be Bello Civil 7,
lib. 1. Caesar left Brutus to complete the siege of Marseilles, and hastened on
to the attack of Afranius and Petreius, the generals of Pompey, at Ilerda
(Lerida) in Spain.

4 Abbot.] Alberto, abbot of San Zeno in Verona, when Frederick I. was
emperor, by whom Milan was besieged and reduced to ashes, in 1162.

5 There is he.] Alberto della Scala, Lord of Verona, who had made his
natural son abbot of San Zeno.

125—142. PURGATORY, Canto XIX. 253

And born in evil, lie hath set ill 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,1 to whom the sea
Open'd, or ever Jordan saw his heirs :
And they,2 who with iEneas 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.

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 the fifth.

It was the hour,3 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 4 sees

1 First they died.] The Israelites, who on account of their disobedience
died before reaching the promised land.

2 And they.] Those Trojans, who, wearied with their voyage, chose rather
to remain in Sicily with Acestes, than accompany ^Eneas to Italy. Virg. sEn.
lib. 5.

3 The hour.] Near the dawn.

4 The geomancer.] The geomancers, says Landino, when they divined, drew
a figure consisting 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." Chaucer has imitated this in a description of morning
(Troilus and Creseide, b. 3.), for he did not find it in his original, Boccaccio's
Filostrato :

But when the cocke, commune astrologer,
Gan on his brest to bete, and after crowe,
And Lucifer the dayis messanger
Gan for to rise, and out his bemis throwe,
And estward rose, to him that could it knowe,
Fortuna Major.

254 THE VISION. 5—37.

His Greater Fortune up the east ascend,
Where grey dawn checkers first the shadowy cone ;
When, 'fore me in my dream, a woman's shape x
There came, with lips that stammer'd, eyes aslant,
Distorted feet, hands maim'd, and colour 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 2 illumed. Recovering speech,
She forthwith, warbling, such a strain began,
That I, how loth soe'er, could scarce have held
Attention from the song. " I," thus she sang,
" I am the Syren, 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 3 by my lay
Enchanted drew. Whoe'er frequents me once,
Parts seldom : so I 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 4 of semblance holy. With stern voice
She utter'd : "Say, 0 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 thns 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 ;

1 A woman's shape] Worldly happiness. This allegory reminds us of the
" Choice of Hercules."

2 Love's own hue.]

A smile that glow'd

Celestial rosy red, love's proper hue. Milton, P. L. b. 8. 619.

facies pulcherrima tunc est,

Quum porphyriaco variatur Candida rubro.

Quid color hie roseus sibi vult ? designat amorem :

Quippe amor est igni similis ; flammasque rubentes

Ignis habere solet. Palingenii Zodiacus Vita;, lib. 12.

3 Ulysses.'] It is not easy to determine why Ulysses, contrary to the authority
of Homer, is said to have been drawn aside from his course by the song of the
Syren. No improbable way of accounting for the contradiction is, to suppose
that she is here represented as purposely deviating from the truth. Or Dante
may have followed some legend of the Middle Ages, in which the wanderings of
Ulysses were represented otherwise than in Homer.

4 A dame.] Philosophy, or perhaps Truth.

38-71. PURGATORY, CANTO XIX. 255

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,

Who bends him to the likeness of an arch

That midway spans the Hood ; 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,1
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 ; 2 and thy raised ken
Fix on the lure, which heaven's eternal King
Whirls in the rolling spheres." As on his feet
The falcon 3 first looks down, then to the sky
Turns, and forth stretches eager for the food,
That wooes 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.

1 Who mourn.] "Blessed are tliey that mourn; for they shall he com-
forted." Matt. v. 4. »

2 Let thy heels spurn the earth.'] This is a metaphor from hawking, though
less apparent than in the lines that follow.

3 The'fakon.] Poi come fa '1 falcon, quando si move,

Cosi Umilta al cielo alzo la vista.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. v.

Io vidi poi color tutti levare

Inverso il cielo, come fa '1 falcone,

Quando la preda sua prende in su l'are. Ibid. cap. xiii.

One of our periodical critics has remarked, that Dante must have loved hawk-
ing ; and "that he paints his bird always to the life." Edinburgh Review,
No. lviii. p. 472. In the same manner Mr. Blomfield supposes that JSschylus
was addicted to fishing, because he often takes his metaphors from fishing-nets.
See that gentleman's Notes to the Pcrscv, Glossar. v. 430.

256 THE VISION. 72—112.

"My soul l hath cleaved to the dust," I heard

With sighs so deep, they well nigh choked the words.

" 0 ye elect of God ! whose penal woes
Both hope and justice mitigate, direct
Towards the steep rising our uncertain way."

" If ye approach secure from this our doom,
Prostration, and would urge your course with speed,
See that ye still to right ward keep the brink."

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 : 2
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 aught, 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,3 and the name
And title of my lineage, from that stream 4
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 discern'd 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 enamour'd, in my bosom love
Of purer being kindled. For till then

1 My soul.] " My soul cleaveth to the dust : quicken thou me according to
thy word." Psalm cxix. 25.

2 / noted what remain'd yet hidden from them.] They were ignorant, it
appeared, whether Dante was come there to be purged of his sins.

3 The successor of Peter.] Ottobuono, of the family of Fieschi, Counts
of Lavagno, died thirty-nine days after he became pope, with the title of
Adrian V., in 1276.

4 That stream.] The river Lavagno, in the Genoese territory ; to the east of
which territory are situated Siestri and Chiaveri.

113—143. PURGATORY, Canto XIX. 257

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.

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 ; x 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 : 2 thy fellow servant I,
(Thine and all others') of one Sovran Power.
If thou hast ever mark'd those holy sounds
Of gospel truth, * nor shall be given in marriage,' 3
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 spakest.4
I have on earth a kinswoman ; 5 her name
Alagia, worthy in herself, so ill
Example of our house corrupt her not :
And she is all remaineth of me there."

1 Were lifted.] Rosa Morando and Lombardi are very severe on Venturi's
perplexity occasioned by the word " aderse." They have none of them noticed
Landino's reading of "aperse." Ediz. 1484.

2 Err not.] " And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me,
See thou do it not : I am thy fellow servant, and of thy brethren that have the
testimony of Jesus." Rev. xix. 10.

3 Xor shall be given in marriage.] " Since in this state we neither marry
nor are given in marriage, I am no longer the spouse of the church, and there-
fore no longer retain my former dignity." See Matt. xxii. 30.

4 That whereof thou speakest.] See v. 89.

5 A kinmcoman.] Alagia is said to have been the wife of the Marchese
Marcello Malaspina, one of the Poet's protectors during his exile. See Canto
viii. 133.

258 THE VISION. 1—25.

CANTO XX.

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."

Ill strives the will, 'gainst will more wise that strives :
His pleasure therefore to mine own preferr'd,
I drew the sponge 1 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 ! 2 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,3 for whom fate reserves
To chase her hence 1 — 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 " 0 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 clown.
O good Fabricius ! 4 thou didst virtue chuse

1 1 drew the sponge.] " I did not persevere in my inquiries from the spirit,
though still anxious to learn more."

2 Wolf.] Avarice.

3 Of his appearing.'] He is thought to allude to Can Grande della Scala.
See Hell, Canto i. 98.

4 Fabricius.] So our author in the second book of the Be Monarchic, p. 121 :
"Nonne Fabricium," etc. "Has not Fabricius given us another example of
resisting avarice, when, poor as he was, he preserved his faith to the republic,
and rejected with scorn a great sum of gold that was offered him ? " Our Poet
iu the sixth book records this, when be says :

Parvoque potentem

Fabricium."
Compare Petrarch, Tr. della Fama, c. i. :

Un Curio ed un Fabricio assai piu belli
Con la lor poverta, che Mida e Crasso
Con l'oro ond' a virtu furon rubelli.

26—54. PURGATORY, Canto XX. 259

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,1 which on the maidens he
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."

" I," 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 2
Of that ill plant, whose shade such poison sheds
O'er all the Christian land, that seldom thence
Good fruit is gathered. Vengeance soon should come,
Had Ghent and Douay, Lille and Bruges power,3
Vnd 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 4 at Paris. When the race
Of ancient kings had vanish'd (all save one 5
Wrapt up in sable weeds) within my gripe
I found the reins of empire, and such powers

1 Nicholas. ] The story of Nicholas is, that an angel having revealed to him
that the father of a family was so impoverished as to resolve on exposing the
chastity of his three daughters to sale, he threw in at the window of their house
three bags of money, containing a sufficient portion for each of them.

2 Root.] Hugh Capet, ancestor of Philip IV.

3 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
defeat of the French army by the Flemings, in the battle of Courtrai, which
happened in 1302.

4 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
Capet, who came to the throne of France in 987, 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 a butcher, at Paris, and whether the sanguinary
disposition of Hugh Capet's father is not stigmatized by this opprobrious
appellation. See Cancellieri, Osservazioni, etc. Eoma, 1814, p. 6.

5 All save one.] The posterity of Charlemagne, the second race of French
monarchs, had failed, with the exception of Charles of Lorraine, who is said,
on account of the melancholy temper of his mind, to have always clothed
himself in black. Venturi suggests that Dante may have confounded him
with Childeric III., the last of the Merovingian, or first race, who was deposed
and made a monk in 751.

260 THE VISION. 55—64.

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,1
He, from whose bones the anointed race begins.
Till the great dower of Provence 2 had removed
The stains,3 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,4
Poitou it seized, Navarre and Gascony.5

1 My son. ] Hugh Capet catised his son Robert to be crowned at Orleans.

2 The great dower of Provence.'] Louis IX. and his brother, Charles of
Anjou, married two of the four daughters of Raymond Berenger, Count of
Provence. See Par. c. vi. 135.

3 The stains.] Lombardi understands this differently from all the other
commentators with whom I am acquainted. The word "vergogna" he takes
in the sense of "a praise-worthy shame of doing ill ;" and according to him
the translation should run thus :

The shame that yet restrain'd my race from ill.
By " Provenza " he understands the estates of Toulouse, the dowry of the
only daughter of Raymond, Count of Toulouse, married to a brother of
Louis IX.

4 For amends.] This is ironical.

5 Poitou it seized, Navarre and Gascony.] I venture to read —

Potti e Navarra prese e Guascogna.
instead of Ponti e Normandia prese e Guasgogna.

Seized Ponthieu, Normandy, and Gascogny.
Landino has "Potti," and he is probably right: for Poitou was annexed to
the French crown by Philip IV. See Henault, AbregS Chron. A.D. 1283,
etc. Normandy had been united to it long before by Philip Augustus, a
circumstance of which it is difficult to imagine that Dante should have been
ignorant ; but Philip IV., says Henault, ibid., took the title of King of
Navarre : and the subjugation of Navarre is also alluded to in the Paradise,
Canto xix. 140. In 1293, Philip IV. summoned Edward I. to do him homage
for the duchy of Gascogny, which he had conceived the design of seizing.
See G. Villani, lib. 8. cap. iv. The whole passage has occasioned much
perplexity. I cannot withhold from my readers the advantage of an attempt
made to unravel it by the late Archdeacon Fisher, which that gentleman,
though a stranger, had the goodness to communicate to me in the following
terms : " I am eucouraged to offer you an elucidation of a passage, with the
interpretation of which I was never yet satisfied. As it goes to establish the
accuracy of two very happy conjectures which you have made at Purg. xx.
66, you will perhaps forgive me, if my notion a little militates against your
solution of the difficulty. The passage is as follows :

r fui radice della mala pianta,

Che la terra Cristiana tutta aduggia,

Si che buon frutto rado se ne schianta.

Ma se Doagio, Guanto, Lilla, e Bruggia

Potesser, tosto ne saria vendetta :

Ed io la cheggio a lui, che tutto giuggia.

Mentre che la gran dote Provenzale
Al sangue mio non tolse la vergogna,
Poco valea, ma pur non facea male.
Li comincio con forza e con menzogna

65—69. PURGATORY, Canto XX. 261

To Italy came Charles ; and for amends,
Young Conradine,1 an innocent victim, slew ;
And sent the angelic teacher 2 back to heaven,
Still for amends. I see the time at hand,
That forth from France invites another Charles 3

La sua rapina ; e poscia, per ammenda,
Potti e Navarra prese, e Guascogna.

It is my persuasion that the stanzas I have copied are one passage, con-
tinuous in its sense, interrupted only by a parenthesis of four stanzas, which
are introduced as necessary to the political solution of the meaning. Again,
I think that my quoted stanzas refer to only one person, and that Philip IV.
of France. He is depicted by both the phrases, mala pianta, and sangue mio.
I do not find that Louis IX. obtained any part of Provence by dowry, owing to
his marriage with the daughter of the prince of that country ; at least nothing
equivalent to the words la gran dote Provenzale. I suppose the stanzas
quoted to depict the three great events in the life of Philip IV. He married,
during the life of his father, the heiress of the kingdom of Navarre, and also
of the duchy of Champagne. Philip obtained at once the sovereignty of
both these dowries, and left to his son Philip V. the title of King of France
and Navarre. On the accession of Philip IV. to the throne, he became
embroiled with the English respecting the duchy of Guienne, which, after
having changed masters frequently, was then in the possession of Edward I.
The word Guienne included Poitou and Gascony, and was generally the
country termed by Csesar, Aquitania. By perfidy, and the childish ignor-
ance of Edmund, the brother of Edward I., Philip got possession of Guienne.

The duchy of Champagne, now annexed to the crown of France,

lying adjacent to that of Flauders, Philip next endeavoured to lay hands on
that fief: and failing in treacherous negotiation, he carried a cruel and
murderous war into the Low Countries, and laid them desolate. His progress
was stopped by the Flemings at the battle of Courtrai, and he was soon after
compelled to surrender Guienne to the English king, and to make peace
with his numerous enemies. Now to these three leading epochs of Philip's
life, the Poet seems to allude. Doagio, Guanto, Lilla e Bruggia refer to his
desolating war in Flanders ; Vendetta, to the battle of Courtrai ; la gran
dote Provenzale, to the dowry of the kingdom of Navarre and the duchy of
Champagne ; forza e menzogna, to his conduct respecting Guienne, with its
two sister provinces, as you so convincingly conjectured, Potti e Guascogna."

1 Young Conradine.] Charles of Anjou put Conradino to death in 1268,
and became King of Naples. See Hell, Canto xxviii. 16, and Note. Compare
Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xxix.

2 The angelic teacher.'] Thomas Aquinas. He was reported to have been
poisoned by a physician, who wished to ingratiate himself with Charles of
Anjou. " In the year 1323, at the end of July, by the said Pope John and by
his cardinals, was canonized at Avignon Thomas Aquinas, of the order of Saint
Dominic, a master in divinity and philosophy, a man most excellent in all
science, and who expounded the sense of Scripture better than any one since
the time of Augustin. 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 himself 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 cardinal : whence the church of God received great damage. He died
at the abbey of Fossanova, in Campagna." G. Villani, lib. 9. cap. ccxviii.
We shall find him in the Paradise, Canto x.

3 Another Charles.] Charles of Valois, brother of Philip IV., was sent
by Pope Boniface VIII. to settle the disturbed state of Florence. In con-

262 THE VISION. 70-92.

To make himself and kindred better known.

Unarm'd he issues, saving with that lance,

Which the arch- traitor tilted with j1 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 2 (who a prisoner late

Had stept on shore) exposing to the mart

His daughter, whom he bargains for, as do

The Corsairs for their slaves. 0 avarice !

What canst thou more, who hast subdued our blood

So wholly to thyself, they feel no care

Of their own flesh ? To hide with direr guilt

Past ill and future, lo ! the flower-de-luce 3

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,

sequence of the measures he adopted for that purpose, our Poet and his friends
were condemned to exile and death. See G. Villani, lib. 8. c. xlviii.

1 with that lance,

Which the arch-traitor tilted ivith.]

con la lancia

Con la qual giostro Giuda.
If I remember right, in one of the old romances, Judas is represented tilting
with our Saviour.

2 The other.'] Charles, King of Naples, the eldest son of Charles of Anjou,
having, contrary to the directions of his father, engaged with Ruggier de
Lauria, the Admiral of Peter of Arragon, was made prisoner, and carried into
Sicily, June, 1284. He afterwards, in consideration of a large sum of money,
married his daughter to Azzo VIII. Marquis of Ferrara. I take Lauria to be
the hero meant by Petrarch in his Triumph of Fame :

Quel di Luria seguiva il Saladino. Cap. ii. v. 151.
Of whom Biagioli says in a note, " Non so chi sia, e non trovo ne vivo ne
morto chi mel dica." " I know not who he is, and I find no one alive or dead
to tell me." Mariana, lib. 14. cap. x., calls Lauria "a brave captain, signal-
ized by his former victories." See also the seventh book of G. Villani's history,
and Boccaccio's Decameron, G. v. N. 6 ; where he is named Huggieri dell' Oria.

3 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. 8. 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 chapter. Thus, says Landing, was verified the prophecy of Ce-
lestine respecting him, that he should enter on the popedom like a fox, reign
like a lion, and die like a dog.

93—118. PURGATORY, Canto XX. 263

With no decree to sanction, pushes on
Into the temple l his yet eager sails.

" O sovran Master ! 2 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 3 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,4 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, 5 how he stole the prey,
That yet he seems by Joshua's ire pursued.
Sapphira with her husband next we blame ;
And praise the forefeet, that with furious ramp
Spurn'd Heliodorus.6 All the mountain round
Rings with the infamy of Thracia's king,7
Who slew his Phrygian charge : and last a shout
Ascends : * Declare, 0 Crassus ! 8 for thou know'st,
The flavour 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

1 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 h.tter appears more probable.

2 0 sovran Master.] Lombardi, who rightly corrects Venturi's explanation
of this passage, with which I will not trouble the reader, should have
acknowledged, if he was conscious of it, that his own interpretation of it was
the same as that before given by Vellutello : " When, 0 Lord, shall I behold
that vengeance accomplished, which being already determined in thy secret
judgment, thy retributive justice even now contemplates with delight ? "

3 What thou didst hear.] See v. 21.

4 Pygmalion.] Ille Sychseum

Impius ante aras, atque auri csecus amore,

Clam ferro incautum superat. Virg. ^En. lib. 1. 350.

5 Achan.] Joshua, vii.

6 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 Maccabees, iii. 25.

1 Thracia's king.] Polymnestor, the murderer of Polydorus. Hell, Canto
xxx. 19.

8 Crassus.] Marcus Crassus, who fell miserably in the Parthian war. See
Appian, Parthica.

E vidi Ciro piu di sangue avaro,

Che Crasso d'oro, e l'uno e l'altro n'ebbe

Tanto, che parve a ciascheduno amaro. Petrarca.

264 THE VISION. 119-144.

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
Immoveably 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.

CANTO XXL

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 beholding Virgil.

The natural thirst, ne'er quench'd but from the well l
Whereof the woman of Samaria craved,
Excited ; haste, along the cumber'd path,
After my guide, impell'd ; and pity moved
My bosom for the 'vengeful doom though just.
When lo ! even as Luke 2 relates, that Christ
Appear'd unto the two upon their way,

i The well] " The woman saith unto him, Sir, give me this water, that
I thirst not." John, iv. 15.
2 Luke.] Chapter xxiv. 13.

8—44. PURGATORY, Canto XXI. 265

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 ; l "If that ye be spirits whom God
Vouchsafes not room above ; who up the height
Has been thus far your guide 1 " To whom the bard :
" If thou observe the tokens,2 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,3 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
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 its 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 :
" In its devotion, nought 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, 4 no influence

1 nor from his speed iiieanwhile

Desisting.'] The unintelligible reading of almost all the editions here
(but not of all, as Lombardi would lead us to suppose, except his favourite
Nidobeatina) is

E perche andate forte ?
Vellutello has also that which is no doubt the right :

E parte andava forte.

2 The tokens.] The letter P for Peccata, sins, inscribed upon his forehead
by the Angel, in order to his being cleared of them in his passage through
Purgatory to Paradise.

3 She.] Lachesis, one of the three fates.

4 that, which heaven in itself

Doth of itself receive.] Venturi, I think rightly, interprets this to be ligrt.

266 THE VISION. 45—80.

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.

Vapour 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 2

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

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 net3
That takes ye here ; and how the toils are loosed ;
Why rocks the mountain, and why ye rejoice.
Vouchsafe, that from thy lips I next may learn

1 Thaumantian.'} Figlia di Tauniante.

S»-j/j,cniTos 8vyxr*i£. Hesiod, Theog. 780.

Compare Plato, Thecet. vol. ii. p. 76, Bip. edit. ; Virg. ^En. 9. 5 ; and Spenser,
Faery Queen, b. 5. c. iii. st. 25.

Fair is Thauraantias in her crystal gown. Drummond.

2 To that tvish.] Lombardi here alters the sense by reading with the
Nidobeatina, "con tal voglia," instead of "contra voglia," and explains it:
" With the same ineffectual will, with which man was contrary to sin, while
he resolved on sinning, even with the same, would he wish to rise from his
torment in Purgatory, at the same time that through inclination to satisfy
the divine justice he yet remains there."

z I see the net] "I perceive that ye are detained here by your wish to
satisfy the divine justice."

81—111. PURGATORY, Canto XXI. 267

Who on the earth thou wast ; and wherefore here,

So many an age, wert prostrate." — " In that time,

When the good Titus,1 with Heaven's King to help,

Avenged those piteous gashes, whence the blood

By Judas sold did issue ; with the name 2

Most lasting and most honour'd, there, was I

Abundantly renown'd," the shade replied,

" Not yet with faith endued. So passing sweet

My vocal spirit ; from Tolosa,3 Rome

To herself drew me, where I merited

A myrtle garland 4 to in wreathe my brow.

Statius they name me still. Of Thebes I sang,

And next of great Achilles ; but i' the way

Fell 6 with the second burthen. Of my flame

Those sparkles were the seeds, which I derived

From the bright fountain of celestial fire

That feeds nnnumber'd lamps ; the song I mean

Which sounds ^Eneas' 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 me ;
And holding silence, by his countenance
Enjoin'd me silence : but the power, which wills,
Bears not supreme control : laughter and tears
Follow so closely on the passion prompts them,
They wait not for the motions of the will
In natures most sincere. I did but smile,6

1 When the good Titus.] When it was so ordered by the divine Providence
that Titus, by the destruction of Jerusalem, should avenge the death of our
Saviour on the Jews.

2 The name.] The name of Poet.

3 From Tolosa.] Dante, as many others have done, confounds Statius the
poet, who was a Neapolitan, with a rhetorician of the same name, who was of
Tolosa, or Thoulouse. Thus Chaucer, Temple of Fame, b. 3. :

The Tholason, that height Stace.
And Boccaccio, as cited by Lombard! :

E Stazio di Tolosa ancora caro. Amoros. Vis. Cant. 5.

4 A myrtle garland.]

Et vos, 0 lauri, carpam, et te, proxima myrte. Virg. Eel. ii.
Qual vaghezza di lauro ? o qual di mirto ? Petrarca.

Yet once more, 0 ye laurels, and once more,

Ye myrtles brown. Milton, Lycidas.

5 Fell.] Statius lived to write only a small part of the Achilleid.

6 / did but smile.] " I smiled no more than one would do who wished by a
smile to intimate his consciousness of any thing to another person."

268 THE VISION. 112—137.

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 emprize," he cried,

" Say, why across thy visage beam'd, hut 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, 0 ancient spirit i

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, answered thus : " Now hast thou proved
The force and ardour of the love I bear thee,
When I forget we are but things of air,
And, as a substance, treat an empty shade."

CANTO XXII.

Argument.

Dante, Virgil, and Statius mount to the sixth cornice, where the sin of glut-
tony is cleansed, the two Latin Poets discoursing 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, recording examples of temperance.

Now 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,

1 Blessed.'] " Blessed be they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness,
for they shall be filled." Matt. v. 6.

7—45. PURGATORY, Canto XXII. 269

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,1
AVho 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 licence, 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 1 "

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
I 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,2 thou cursed thirst
1 Of gold ! dost not with juster measure guide
1 The appetite of mortals 1 ' I had met
The fierce encounter 3 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

1 Aquinum's bard.] Juvenal had celebrated his contemporary, Statius, Sat.
vii. 82 ; though some critics imagine that there is a secret derision couched
under his praise.

2 Why."] Quid non mortalia pectora cogis,

Auri sacra fames ? Virg. JEn. lib. 3. 57.

Venturi supposes, that Dante might have mistaken the meaning of the word
sacra, and construed it "holy," instead of " cursed." But I see no necessity
for having recourse to so improbable a conjecture.

3 The fierce encounter.] See Hell, Canto vii. 26.

270 THE VISION. 46—82.

Shall with shorn locks l 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 sovran of the pastoral song :
" While thou didst sing that cruel warfare waged
By the twin sorrow of Jocasta's womb,2
From thy discourse with Clio 3 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 hoise the sail,
And follow where the fisherman had led ?"

He answering thus : " By thee conducted first,
I enter'd the Parnassian grots, and quaffd
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
Behind, that profits not himself, but makes
His followers wise, when thou exclaimed'st, ' Lo !
'A renovated world,4 Justice return'd,
1 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 colouring. 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

1 With shorn locks.] See Hell, Canto vii. 58.

2 The twin sorrow of Jocasta's womb.] Eteocles and Polynices.

3 With Clio.]

Quem prius heroura Clio dabis ? immodicum irse

Tydea? laurigeri subitos an vatis hiatus? Stat. Thebaid. 1. 42.

4 A renovated world.]

Magnus ab integro sseclorum nascitur ordo.

Jam redit et Virgo ; redeunt Saturnia regna ;

Jam nova progenies ccelo demittitur alto. Virg. Eel. iv. 5.

For the application of Virgil's prophecy to the incarnation, see Natalis Alex-
ander, Hist. Eccl. Scec. i. Dissert. 1. Paris, 1679, vol. i. p. 166.

83—106. PURGATORY, Canto XXII. 271

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 succour'd them ;

And their most righteous customs made me scorn

All sects besides. Before x 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 2 bides,

Csecilius,3 Plautus, Varro : 4 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,5

Of mortals, the most cherish'd by the nine,

In the first ward G of darkness. There, oft-times,

We of that mount hold converse, on whose top

For aye our nurses live. We have the bard

Of Pella,7 and the Teian,8 Agatho,9

Simonides, and many a Grecian else

1 Before.] Before I had composed the Thebaid.

2 Our old Terence.'] " Antico," which is found in many of the old editions,
seems preferable to "amico."

3 Ccecilius.] Csecilius Statius, a Latin comic poet, of whose works some
fragments only remain. Our Poet had Horace in his eye :

Dicitur Afrani toga convenisse Menandro,

Plautus ad exemplar Siculi properare Epicharmi,

Vincere Caecilius gravitate, Terentius arte. Epist. lib. 2. i.

4 Varro.] "Quam multa pene omnia tradidit Varro." Quintilian, Instit.
Oral. lib. 12. " Vix aperto ad philosophiam aditu, primus M. Varro veterum
omnium doctissimus." Sadolet. de liberis recte instit., edit. Lugd. 1533,
p. 137.

5 That Greek.] Homer.

6 In the first ward.] In Limbo.
7 The bard

Of Pella.] Euripides.

8 The Teian.] Euripide v' e nosco e Anacreonte.

The Monte Casino MS. reads "Antifonte," "Antipho," instead of "Ana-
creonte." Dante probably knew little more of these Greek writers than the
names.

9 Agatho.] Chaucer, speaking of the Daisy as a representation of Alcestis,
refers to Agaton :

No wonder is though Jove her stellifie,

As tellith Agaton for her goodnesse. Legende of Good Women.

And Mr. Tyrwhitt tells us that "he has nothing to say of this writer except
that one of the same name is quoted in the Prol. to the Tragedie of Cambises,
by Thomas Preston. There is no reason," he adds, "for supposing with

272 THE VISION. 107-121.

Ingarlanded with laurel. Of thy train,1

Antigone is there, Deiphile,

Argia, and as sorrowful as erst

Ismene, and who show'd Langia's wave : 2

Deidamia with her sisters there,

And blind Tiresias' daughter,3 and the bride

Sea-born of Peleus." 4 Either poet now

Was silent ; and no longer by the ascent

Or the steep walls obstructed, round them cast

Inquiring eyes. Four handmaids 6 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,

Gloss. Ur. that a philosopher of Samos is meant, or any of the Agathoes of
antiquity." I am inclined, however, to believe that Chaucer must have meant
Agatho, the dramatic writer, whose name, at least, appears to have been
familiar in the Middle Ages ; for, besides the mention of him in the text, he is
cpioted by Dante in the Treatise De Monarchic, lib. 3. : " Deus per nuncium
facere non potest, genita non esse, genita, juxta sententiam Agathonis." The
original is to be found in Aristotle, Ethic. Nicom. lib. 6. cap. ii.

"Movov yotf oti/rov xu.) 8ii>s (m^iirx\roti
AyitriTot trotuv oLrtr' «v $ xiX£u.y/jt,i)i*.

Agatho is mentioned by Xenophon in his Symposium, by Plato in the Prota-
goras, and in the Banquet, a favourite book with our author, and by Aristotle
in his Art of Poetry, where the following remarkable passage occurs respecting
him, from which I will leave it to the reader to decide whether it is possible
that the allusion in Chaucer might have arisen : l» nUut A"» l» *i ^« «8» yvu^i^m

irriv ov9u.oi.TMv, r« <5s «XX« iriToi*i/u.tva,' iv tvlous hi oLOiv oTov Iv raj 'Ayoiduvos AvOu.
ifMiui ykf it to'jtu 7» ri x^ccy/xocroe, xcii ret, ivb/Aocra. trirairtrxi, x.cu oi/Ztn yjttov tu$%a.i:U.

Edit, ljy-l, p. Sol "There are, however, some tragedies, in which one or two
of the names are historical, and the rest feigned ; there are even some, in which
none of the names are historical ; such is Agatho's tragedy called The Flower ;
for in that all is invention, both incidents and names ; and yet it pleases."
Aristotle's Treatise on Poetry, by Thomas Twining, 8vo, edit. 1812, vol. i.
p. 128.

1 Of thy train.] " Of those celebrated in thy Poem."

2 Who show'd Langia's leave.] Hypsipile. See Note to Canto xxvi. v. 87.

3 Tiresias' daughter.] Dante, as some have thought, had forgotten that ho
had placed Manto, the daughter of Tiresias, among the sorcerers. See Hell,
Canto xx. Vellutello endeavours, rather awkwardly, to reconcile the apparent
inconsistency, by observing, that although she was placed there as a sinner,
yet, as one of famous memory, she had also a place among the worthies in
Limbo. Lombardi, or rather the Delia Crusca academicians, excuse our author
better, by observing that Tiresias had a daughter named Daphne. See
Dio,dorus Siculus, lib. 4. sec. 66. I have here to acknowledge a communication
made to me by the learned writer of an anonymous letter, who observes that
Manto and Daphne are only different names for the same person ; and that
Servius, in his Commentary on the jEneid, x. 198, says, that some make Manto
the prophetess to be a daughter of Hercules.

4 The bride

Sea-born of Peleus.] Thetis.

5 Four handmaids.] Compare Canto xii. v. 74.

122—150. PURGATORY, Canto XXII. 273

As we have ever used." So custom there
Was usher to the road ; the which we chose
Less doubtful, as that worthy shade l 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 ; 2 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 3
For joy and honour of the nuptial feast,
Than for herself, who answers now for you.
The women of old Rome 4 were satisfied .
With water for their beverage. Daniel 5 fed
On pulse, and wisdom gain'd. The primal 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."

1 That wwthy shade. ,] Statius.

2 Downtvard this less ample spread.] The early commentators understand
that this tree had its root upward and the boughs downward ; and this
opinion, however derided by their successors, is not a little countenanced by
the imitation of Frezzi, who lived so near the time of our Poet :

Su dentro al cielo avea la sua radice,
E giu inverso terra i rami spande. II Qiiadrir. lib. 4. cap. i.

It had in heaven

Its root above, and downward to the earth
Stretch'd forth the branches.

3 Mary took more thought.] " The blessed Virgin, who answers for you now
in heaven, when she said to Jesus, at the marriage in Cana of Galilee, ' They
have no wine,' regarded not the gratification of her own taste, but the honour
of the nuptial banquet."

4 The women of old Rome.] See Valerius Maximus, lib. 2. cap. i.

5 Daniel.] "Then said Daniel to Melzar, whom the prince of the eunuchs
had set over Daniel, Hananiah, Michael, and Azariah, Prove thy servants, I
beseech thee, ten days ; and let them give us pulse to eat, and water to drink."
Daniel, i. 11, 12. " Thus Melzar took away the portion of their meat, and the
wine that they should drink : and gave them pulse. As for these four children,
God gave them knowledge and skill in all learning and wisdom : and Daniel
had understanding in all visions and dreams." Ibid. 16, 17.

S

274 THE VISION. 1—27.

CANTO XXIII.

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.

On 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 cheerM
I journeyed on, and felt no toil : and lo !
A sound of weeping, and a song : " My lips,1
O Lord ! " and these so mingled, it gave birth
To pleasure and to pain. " 0 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,
A crowd of spirits, silent and devout.
The eyes 2 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 Erisicthon show'd,
When pinch'd by sharp-set famine to the quick.

" Lo ! " to myself I mused, " the race, who lost
Jerusalem, when Mary 3 with dire beak
Prey'd on her child." The sockets seemed as rings,4

1 My lips.] " 0 Lord, open thou my lips ; and my mouth shall show forth
thy praise." Psalm li. 15.

2 The eyes.] Compare Ovid, Metam. lib. 8. 801 :

Hirtus erat crinis ; cava lumina, pallor in ore :

Dura cutis, per quam spectari viscera possent :
Ossa sub incurvis exstabant arida lumbis.
3 When Mary.] Josephus, De Bello Jud. lib. 7. cap. xxi. p. 954. Ed. Gene v.
fol. 1611. The shocking story is well told.
* Rings.] Senza fior prato o senza gemma anello.

Petrarca, Son. Lasciata hat, niorte.
0 ring of which the rubie is outfall.

Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, b. 5.

In this habit

Met I my father with his bleeding rings,

Their precious stones new lost. Shakspeare, Lear, act v. sc. 3.

28—65. PURGATORY, Canto XXIII. 275

From which the gems were dropt. Who reads the name x

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 alter' d lineaments

Was kindled from that spark ; and I agnized

The visage of Forese.2 "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 ? The whilst
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 odour, 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 :

1 Who reads the name.] " He who pretends to distinguish the letters which
form OMO in the features of the human face, might easily have traced out the
M on their emaciated countenances." The temples, nose, and forehead are
supposed to represent this letter ; and the eyes the two O's placed within each
side of it.

2 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 author's political
enemy. See next Canto, v. 81. Tiraboschi, after Crescimbeni, enumerates
him among the Tuscan poets. Stor. della Poes. It. vol. i. p. 139.

276 THE VISION. 66—95.

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 x 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,2 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 3 cheeks. Her prayers devout,

Her 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,4

Hath dames more chaste, and modester by far,

Than that wherein I left her. 0 sweet brother !

"What wouldst thou have me say ? 5 A time to come

Stands full within my view, to which this hour

Shall not be counted of an ancient date,

When from the pulpit shall be loudly warn'd

The unblushing dames of Florence,6 lest they bare

Unkerchief d bosoms to the common gaze.

1 If the power.] " If thou didst delay thy repentance to the last, when thou
hadst lost the power of sinning, how happens it thou art arrived here so
early ? "

2 Lower.] In the Ante-Purgatory. See Canto ii.

3 My Nella.] The wife of Forese.

* The tract, most barbarous of Sardinia's isle.] The Barbagia is a part of
Sardinia, to which that name was given, on account of the uncivilized state of
its inhabitants, who are said to have gone nearly naked.

6 What wouldst thou have vie say ?] The interrogative, which Lombardi
would dismiss from this place, as unmeaning and superfluous, appears to me
to be the natural result of a deep feeling, and to prepare us for the invective
that follows.

6 The uiiblushing dames of Florence.] Landino's note exhibits a curious
instance of the changeableness of his countrywomen. He even goes beyond
the acrimony of the original. "In those days," says the commentator, "no
less than in ours, the Florentine ladies exposed the neck and bosom, a dress,
no doubt, more suitable to a harlot than a matron. But, as they changed
soon after, insomuch that they wore collars up to the chin, covering the whole
of the neck and throat, so have I hopes they will change again ; not indeed so
much from motives of decency, as through that fickleness, which pervades
every action of their lives."

96—129. PURGATORY, Canto XXIV. 277

What savage women hath the world e'er seen,
What Saracens,1 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 the cheek of him be clothed with down,
Who is now rock'd with lullaby 2 asleep.
Ah ! now, my brother, hide thyself no more :
Thou seest 3 how not I alone, but all,
Gaze, where thou veil'st the intercepted sun."
Whence I replied : " If thou recal 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 that glisters yonder," and I show'd
The sun. " 5Tis 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."

CAi\TO XXIV.

Argument.

Forese points out several others by name who are here, like himself, purifying
themselves from the vice of gluttony ; and, amongst the rest, Buonaggiunta

1 Saracens.] "This word, during the Middle Ages, was indiscriminately
applied to Pagans and Mahometans ; in short, to all nations (except the Jews)
who did not profess Christianity." Mr. Ellis's Specimens of Early English
Metrical Romances, vol. i. p. 196 (a note). Loud. 8vo, 1805.

2 With hdlaby.] Colui che mo si consola con nanna.

"Nanna" is said to have been the sound with which the Florentine woman
hushed their children to sleep.

3 Thou seest.] Thou seest how we wonder that thou art here in a living body.

278 THE VISION. 1—20.

of Lucca, with whom our Poet converses. Forese then predicts the violent
end of Dante's political enemy, Corso Donati ; and, when he has quitted
them, the Poet, in company with Statins and Virgil, arrives at another
tree, from whence issue voices that record ancient examples of gluttony ;
and proceeding forwards, they are directed by an angel which way to
ascend to the next cornice of the mountain.

Our 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 wTords

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 % 2 Tell me, if I see

Any of mark, among this multitude

Who eye me thus." — " My sister (she for whom,

'Twixt beautiful and good,3 I cannot say

Which name was fitter) wears e'en now her crown,

And triumphs in Olympus." Saying this,

He added : " Since spare diet 4 hath so wrorn

Our semblance out, 'tis lawful here to name

Each one. This," and his finger then he raised,

" Is Buonaggiunta,5 — Buonaggiunta, he

1 He journeys.'] The soul of Statius perhaps proceeds more slowly, in order
that he may enjoy as long as possible the company of Virgil.

2 Piccarda.'] See Paradise, Canto ill.

3 'Ttvixt beautiful and good."]

Tra bella e onesta

Qual fu piu, lascio in dubbio. Petrarca, Son. Ripensando a quel.

4 Diet] Dieta.

And dieted with fasting every day. Spenser, F. Q. b. 1. c. i. st. 26.
Spare fast that oft with gods doth diet. Milton, H Penseroso.

5 Buonaggiunta.] Buonaggiunta Urbiciani, of Lucca. "There is a can-
zone by this poet, printed in the collection made by the Giunti (p. 209), and
a sonnet to Guido Guinicelli in that made by Corbinelli (p. 169), from which
we collect that he lived not about 1230, as Quadrio supposes (t. ii. p. 159), but
towards the end of the thirteenth century. Concerning other poems by
Buonaggiunta, that are preserved in MS. in some libraries, Crescimbeni may
be consulted." Tiraboschi, Mr. Mathias's ed. vol. i. p. 115. Three of these, a
canzone, a sonnet, and a ballata, have been published in the Anecdota Literaria
ex MSS. Codicibus eruta, 8vo, Koma (no year), vol. hi. p. 453. He is thus
mentioned by our author in his Treatise De Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap. xiii. :
" Next let us come to the Tuscans, who, made senseless by their folly,
arrogantly assume to themselves the title of a vernacular diction, more excel-
lent than the rest ; nor are the vulgar alone misled by this wild opinion, but
many famous men have maintained it, as Guittone d'Arezzo, who never
addicted himself to the polished style of the court, Buonaggiunta of Lucca,

21—28. PURGATORY, Canto XXIV. 279

Of Lucca : and that face beyond him, pierced
Unto a leaner fineness than the rest,
Had keeping of the church ; he was of Tours,1
And purges by wan abstinence away
Bolsena's eels and cups of muscadel." 2

He show'd me many others, one by one :
And all, as they were named, seem'd well content ;
For no dark gesture I discern'd in any.

Gallo of Pisa, Mino Mocato of Sienna, and Brunetto of Florence, whose com-
positions, if there shall be leisure for examining them, will be found not to be
in the diction of the court, but in that of their respective cities." As a speci-
men of Buonaggiunta's manner, the reader will take the following Sonnet from
Corbinelli's Collection added to the Bella Mano : —

Qual uomo e in su la rota per Ventura,

Non si rallegri, perche sia innalzato ;

Che quando piu si mostra chiara, e pura,

Allor si gira, ed hallo disbassato.
E nullo prato ha si fresca verdura,

Che li suoi fiori non cangino stato ;

E questo saccio, che avvien per natura ;

Piu grave cade, chi piu e montato.
Non si dee uomo troppo rallegrare

Di gran grandezza, ne tenere spene ;

Che egli e gran doglia, allegrezza fallire :
Anzi si debbe molto umiliare ;

Non far soperchio, perche aggia gran bene ;

Che ogni monte a valle dee venire.
La Bella Mano e Rime Antiche, ediz. Firenze, 1715, p. 170.

What man is raised on Fortune's wheel aloft,

Let him not triumph in his bliss elate ;
For when she smiles with visage fair and soft,

Then whirls she round, reversing his estate.
Fresh was the verdure in the sunny croft,

Yet soon the wither'd flowerets met their fate ;
And things exalted most, as chanceth oft,

Fall from on high to earth with ruin great.
Therefore ought none too greatly to rejoice

In greatness, nor too fast his hope to hold :

For one, that triumphs, great pain is to fail.
But lowly meekness is the wiser choice ;

And he must down, that is too proud and bold ;

For every mountain stoopeth to the vale.

1 He was of Tours.] Simon of Tours became pope with the title of Martin
IV. in 1281, and died in 1285.

2 Bolsena's eels and cups of muscadel.'] The Nidobeatina edition and the
Monte Casino MS. agree in reading :

L'anguille di Bolsena in la vernaccia ;

from which it would seem, that Martin the Fourth refined so much on
epicurism as to have his eels killed by being put into the wine called vernaccia,
in order to heighten their flavour. The Latin annotator on the MS. relates,
that the following epitaph was inscribed on the sepulchre of the pope :

Gaudent anguillae, quod mortuus hie jacet ille,
Qui quasi morte reas excoriabat eas.

280 THE VISION. 29—52.

I saw, through hunger, Ubaldino 1 grind
His teeth on emptiness ; and Boniface,2
That waved the crozier 3 o'er a numerous flock
I saw the Marquis,4 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 amongst them took such note of me.
Somewhat I heard him whisper of Gentucca : 5
The sound was indistinct, and murmur'd there,6
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,7 that shall make
My city please thee, blame it as they may.8
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.' " 9

To whom I thus : " Count of me but as one,

1 Ubaldino.] Ubaldino degli Ubaldini, of Pila, in the Florentine territory.

2 Boniface.'] Archbishop of Ravenna. By Ventnri lie is called Bonifazio de'
Fieschi, a Genoese ; by Vellutello, the son of the above-mentioned Ubaldini ;
and by Landino, Fraucioso, a Frenchman.

3 Crozier.] It is uncertain whether the word " rocco," in the original, means
a "crozier" or a "bishop's rochet," that is, his episcopal gown. In support
of the latter interpretation Lombardi cites Du Fresne's Glossary, article Roccus.
"Rochettum hodie vocant vestem linteam episcoporum . . . quasi parvum
roccum ; " and explains the verse,

Che pasture) col rocco molte genti :

"who, from the revenues of his bishoprick, supported in luxury a large train
of dependants." If the reader wishes to learn more on the subject, he is
referred to Monti's Proposta, under the word " Rocco."

4 The Marquis.] The Marchese de' Rigogliosi, of Forli. When his butler
told him it was commonly reported in the city that he did nothing but drink,
he is said to have answered: "And do you tell them that I am always
thirsty."

5 Gentucca.] Of this lady it is thought that our Poet became enamoured
during his exile. See Note to Canto xxxi. 56.

6 There.] In the throat, the part in which they felt the torment inflicted by
the divine justice.

7 Whose brow no wimple shades yet.] " Who has not yet assumed the dress
of a woman."

8 Blame it as they may.] See Hell, Canto xxi. 39.

9 Ladies, ye that con the lore of love.]

Donne ch' avete intelletto d'amore.
The first verse of a canzone in our author's Vita Nuova.

53-56. PURGATORY, Canto XXIV. 281

Who am the scribe of love ; that, when he breathes,
Take up my pen, and, as he dictates, write."

"Brother I* said he, " the hindrance, which once held
The notary,1 with Guittone 2 and myself,

1 The notary.] Jacopo da Lentino, called the Notary, a poet of these times.
He was probably an Apulian : for Dante {De Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap. xii.), quot-
ing a verse which belongs to a canzone of his, published by the Giunti, without
mentioning the writer's name, terms him one of "the illustrious Apulians,"
pncfulgentes Apuli. See Tiraboschi, Mr. Mathias's edit. vol. i. p. 137.
Crescimbeni (lib. 1. Delia Volg. Poes. p. 72, 4to ed. 1698) gives an extract from
one of his poems, printed in Allacci's Collection, to show that the whimsical
compositions called " Ariette," are not of modern invention. His poems have
been collected among the Poeti del primo secolo della Lingua Italiana, 2 vols.
8vo, Firenze, 1816. They extend from p. 249 to p. 319 of the first volume.

2 Guittone.] Fra Guittone, of Arezzo, holds a distinguished place in Italian
literature, as, besides his poems printed in the Collection of the Giunti, he has
left a collection of letters, forty in number, which afford the earliest specimen
of that kind of writing in the language. They were published at Ptome in
1743, with learned illustrations by Giovanni Bottari. He was also the first
who gave to the sonnet its regular and legitimate form, a species of composition
in which not only his own countrymen, but many of the best poets in all the
cultivated languages of modern Europe, have since so much delighted.
Guittone, a native of Arezzo, was the son of Viva di Michele. He was of the
order of the "Frati Godenti," of which an account maybe seen in the Notes to
Hell, Canto xxiii. In the year 1293 he founded a monastery of the order of
Camaldoli, in Florence, and died in the following year. Tiraboschi, ibid. p.
119. Dante, in the Treatise De Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap. xiii. (see Note to v. 20,
above), and lib. 2. cap. vi. blames him for preferring the plebeian to the more
courtly style ; and Petrarch twice places him in the company of our Poet.
Triumph of Love, cap. iv. and Son. Par. Sec. "Sennuccio mio." The eighth
book in the collection of the old poets published by the Giunti in 1527 consists
of sonnets and canzoni by Guittone. They are marked by a peculiar solemn-
ity of manner, of which the ensuing sonnet will afford a proof and an example :

Gran piacer Signor mio, e gran desire

Harei d'essere avanti al divin trono,

Dove si prendera pace e perdono

Di suo ben fatto e d'ogni suo fallire ;
E gran piacer harei hor di sentire

Quella sonante tromba e quel gran suono,

E d'udir dire : hora venuti sono,

A chi dar pace, a chi crudel martire.
Questo tutto vorrei caro signore ;

Perche fia scritto a ciaschedun nel volto

Quel che gia tenne ascoso dentro al core :
Allhor vedrete a la mia fronte avvolto

Un brieve, che dira ; che '1 crudo amore

Per voi me prese, e mai non m' ha disciolto.

Great joy it were to me to join the throng,
That thy celestial throne, 0 Lord, surround,
Where perfect peace and pardon shall be found,
Peace for good doings, pardon for the wrong :

Great joy to hear the vault of heaven prolong
That everlasting trumpet's mighty sound,
That shall to each award their final bound,
Wailing to these, to those the blissful song.

282 THE VISION. 57—81.

Short of that new and sweeter style x 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,2 that winter near the Nile,
In squared regiment direct their course,
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,3
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 1 "

" 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,4 where I am set to live,
Is, day by day, more scoop'd of all its good j
And dismal ruin seems to threaten it."

" Go now," he cried : " lo ! he,5 whose guilt is most,

All this, dear Lord, were welcome to my soul.
For on his brow then every one shall bear
Inscribed, what late was hidden in the heart ;

And round my forehead wreathed a letter'd scroll
Shall in this tenor my sad fate declare :
"Love's bondman I from him might never part."

Botta doubts whether some of the sonnets attributed to Guittone in the
Rime Antiche are by that writer. See his Notes to Lettere di Free Guittone,
p. 135.

1 That new and sweeter style.'] He means the style introduced in our Poet's
time.

2 The birds."] Hell, Canto v. 46. Euripides, Helena, 1495, and Statius,
Theb. lib. 5. xii.

3 Tired with the motion of a trotting steed.] I have followed Venturi's
explanation of this passage. Others understand

di trottare e lasso

of the fatigue produced by running.

4 The place.] Florence.

* He.] Corso Donati was suspected of aiming at the sovereignty of Florence.
To escape the fury of his fellow citizens, he fled away on horseback, but fall-
ing, was overtaken and slain, A.D. 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 statesman,
the most renowned and enterprising man of his age in Italy, a comely knight
and of graceful carriage, but very worldly, and in his time had formed many
conspiracies in Florence, and entered into many scandalous practices for the

82—123. PURGATORY, Canto XXIV. 283

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.

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,1
How they their twyfold bosoms, overgorged,
Opposed in fight to Theseus : call to mind
The Hebrews,2 how, effeminate, they stoop'd

sake of attaining state and lordship." G. Villani, lib. 8. cap. xcvi. Tha
character of Corso is forcibly drawn by another of his contemporaries, Dino
Compagni, lib. 3. Muratori, Rer. Ital. Script, torn. ix. p. 523. Gnittone
d'Arezzo's seventh letter is addressed to him. It is in verse.

1 Creatures of the clouds.'] The Centaurs. Ovid, Met. lib. 12. fab. 4.

2 The Hebrews.] Judges, vii.

284 THE VISION. 124—151.

To ease their thirst ; whence Gideon's ranks were thinn'd,
As he to Madian J march'd adown the hills."

Thus near one border coasting, still we heard
The sins of gluttony, witli 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
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 flowers ;
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.

JUnumettt.

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.

It was an hour, when he who climbs, had need
To walk uncrippled : for the sun 2 had now

1 To Madian.'] The matchless Gideon in pursuit

Of Madian and her vanquisht kings.

Milton, Samson Agonistes.

2 The sun.] The sun had passed the meridian two hours, and that meridian
was now occupied by the constellation of Taurus, to which as the Scorpion is
opposite, the latter constellation was consequently at the meridian of night.

3_27. PURGATORY, Canto XXV. 285

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 entered we x upon our way,
One before other ; for, but singly, none
That steep and narrow scale admits to climb.

E'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 questioning my guide arose, and fell,
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,2 that on thy lip
Stands trembling for its flight." Encouraged thus,
I straight began : " How there can leanness come,3
Where is no want of nourishment to feed ? "

"If thou," he answer'd, "hadst remember'd thee,
How Meleager 4 with the wasting brand
Wasted alike, by equal fires consumed ;
This would not trouble thee : and hadst thou thought
How in the mirror 5 your reflected form
With mimic motion vibrates ; what now seems
Hard, had appear'd no harder than the pulp

1 So enter' d we.] Davanti a me anclava la mia guida :
E poi io dietro per una via stretta
Seguendo lei come mia scorta fida.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 2. cap. iii.
The good prelate of Foligno has followed our Poet so closely throughout this
Capitolo, that it would be necessary to transcribe almost the whole of it in
order to show how much he has copied. These verses of his own may well be
applied to him on the occasion.

* Fear not to speed the shaft.'] "Fear not to utter the words that are
already at the tip of thy tongue."

TXutrtrot poi Tol-iv/axr' Z%u m(i xuvuv

Ktx»lrt(rot.i. Pindar, Isthm. v. 60.

Full many a shaft of sounding rhyme

Stands trembling on my lip

Their glory to declare.

3 How there can leanness come.] u How can spirits, that need not corporeal
nourishment, be subject to leanness ? " This question gives rise to the follow-
ing explanation of Statins respecting the formation of the human body from
the first, its junction with the soul, and the passage of the latter to another
world.

4 Meleager.] Virgil reminds Dante that, as Meleager was wasted away by
the decree of the fates, and not through want of blood ; so by the divine
appointment, there may be leanness where there is no need of nourishment.

5 In the mirror.] As the reflexion of a form in a mirror is modified in agree-
ment 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.

286 THE VISION. 28—68.

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."

" If, 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, 0 son, and in thy mind
Keceive 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 vessel on another's blood.
There each unite together ; one disposed
To endure, to act the other, through that power
Derived from whence it came ; J and being met,
It 'gins to work, coagulating first ;
Then vivifies what its own substance made
Consist. With animation now indued,
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 2 clinging to the rock : and there
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 3 of animal becomes, remains
For thy considering. At this point, more wise,
Than thou, has err'd,4 making the soul disjoined
From passive intellect, because he saw
No organ for the latter's use assign'd.

1 From whence it came.] " From the heart," as Lombard! rightly interprets it.

2 „4.s sea-sponge.] The foetus is in this stage a zoophyte.

3 Babe.] By "fante," which is here rendered "babe," is meant "the
human creature." "The creature that is distinguished from others by its
faculty of speech," just as Homer calls men

4 More wise,

Than thou, has err'd.] Averroes is said to be here meant. Venturi refers

69—106. PURGATORY, Canto XXV. 287

" 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 mayst marvel at the word,
Mark the sun's heat ; 1 how that to wine doth change,
Mix'd with the moisture filter'd through the vine.

" When Lachesi3 hath spun the thread,2 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 :
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

to his commentary on Aristotle, De Anim. lib. 3. cap. v., for the opinion that
there is only one universal intellect or mind pervading every individual of the
human race. Much of the knowledge displayed by our Poet in the present
Canto, appears to have been derived from the medical work of Averroes called
the Colliget, lib. 2. f. 10. Ven. 1490, fol.

1 Mark the sun's heat.] Eedi and Tiraboschi (Mr. Mathias's ed. vol. ii. p. 36)
have considered this as an anticipation of a profound discovery of Galileo's in
natural philosophy ; but it is in reality taken from a passage in Cicero, De
Senectute, where, speaking of the grape, he says, "quae, et succo terra? et
calore solis augescens, primo est peracerba gu statu, deindematuratadulcescit."

2 When Lachesis hath spun the thread.'] When a man's life on earth is at
an end.

288 THE VISION. 107—133.

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 feai^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,
" 0 God of mercy ! " l 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 ; " 2
Then in low voice again took up the strain ;
Which once more ended, " To the wood," they cried,
" Ran Dian, and drave forth Callisto 3 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.4

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.

1 "0 God of mercy."] "Summae Deus dementias. " The beginning of the
hymn sung on the Sabbath at matins, as it stands in the ancient breviaries ;
for in the modern it is " summse parens clementise." Lombardi.

2 I do not know a man.] Luke, i. 34.

3 Callisto.] See Ovid, Met. lib. 2. fab. 5.

4 The wound that healeth last] The marginal note in the Monte Casino MS.
on this passage is : "id est ultima litera quae denotat ultimum peccatum
mortale ; " and the editor remarks, that Dante in these last two verses
admonishes himself, and in himself all those guilty of carnal sin, in what
manner the wound, inflicted by it, and expressed by the last P on his fore-
head, may be healed.

1—47. PURGATORY, Canto XXVI. 289

While 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.

This bred occasion first to speak of me.
" He seems," said they, " no insubstantial frame : "
Then, to obtain what certainty they might,
Stretch'd towards me, careful not to overpass
The burning pale. " 0 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 iEthiop 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
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 dispatch
Of the first onward step, from either tribe
Loud clamour rises : those, who newly come,
Shout " Sodom and Gomorrah ! " these, " The cow
Pasiphae enter'd, that the beast she woo'd
Might rush unto her luxury." Then as cranes,
That part towards the Riphsean mountains fly,
Part towards 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. x

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 : " 0 spirits ! secure,
Whene'er the time may be, of peaceful end ;

1 Their first song, weeping, and their several shout.] See the last Canto,
v. 118, and v. 123.

T

290 THE VISION. 48—79.

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

I bear. 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 past behind us." As one, mountain-bred,

Rugged and clownish, if some city's walls

He chance to enter, round him stares agape,

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,1)

He, who before had question'd, thus resumed :

" 0 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, Cflesar 2 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

Amaze,

(Not long the inmate of a noble heart.)]

stupore

Lo qual negli alti cor tosto s'attuta.

Thus Speroni : lo stupore

Lo qual dagli alti cor tosto si parte. Canace.
He does not say that wonder is not natural to a lofty mind, for it is the very

principle Of knowledge : /jmXx yk$ <pi\otr6<fov toZto to *oc.8os, to 6otvfjt,xZiiy, oil yk^

»\Xn k$xh <pi*.oro<pi*s v ee,vr*i. Plato, Theait. edit. Bipont, torn. ii. p. 76, but
that it is not of long continuance in such a mind. On this subject it is well
said by Doctor Horsley : • ' Wonder, connected with a principle of rational
curiosity, is the source of all knowledge and discovery, and it is a principle
even of piety : but wonder, which ends in wonder, and is satisfied with
wonder, is the quality of an idiot." Sermons, vol. i. p. 227. Compare
Aristotle, Metaph. lib. 1. p. 335, edit. Sylb. The above passage from Plate
is adduced by Clemens Alexand. Strom, lib. 2. sec. 9.

2 Ccesar.] For the opprobrium cast on Caesar's effeminacy, see Suetonius.,
Julius Ccesar, cap. xlix.

80—111. PURGATORY, Canto XXVI. 291

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. Of myself

Learn what thou wishest. Guinicelli * I ;

Who having truly sorrow'd ere my last,

Already cleanse me." With sucirpious joy,

As the two sons upon their mother gazed

From sad Lycurgus 2 rescued ; such my joy

(Save that I more repress'd it) when I 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 nought 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. In reply

He thus bespake me : " What from thee I hear

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 3 in love ditties, and the tales of prose,

1 Guinicelli.'] See Note to Canto xi. 96.

2 Lycxirgus.'] Statins, Theb. lib. 4. and 5. Hypsipile had left her infant
charge, the son of Lycnrgus, on a bank, where it was destroyed by a serpent,
when she went to show the Argive army the river of Langia: and, on her
escaping the effects of Lycurgus's resentment, the joy her own children felt
at the sight of her was such, as our Poet felt on beholding his predecessor
(iuinicelli. The incidents are beautifully described in Statius, and seem to
have made an impression on Dante, for he before (Canto xxii. 110) characterizes
Hypsipile as her —

Who show'd Laugia's wave.

3 IIe.~\ The united testimony of Dante and of Petrarch places Arnault
Daniel at the head of the Provencal poets.

poi v'era un drappello

Di portamenti e di volgari strani :
Fra tutti il primo Arnaldo Daniello
Gran maestro d'amor ch' a la sua terra
Ancor fa onor col suo dir nuovo e bello.

Petrarca, Trionfo d'Amvre, cap. iv.

292 THE VISION. 112-113.

Without a rival stands ; and lets the fools
Talk on, who think the songster of Limoges x

That he was born of poor but noble parents, at the castle of Ribeyrac in
Perigord, and that he was at the English court, is the amount of Millot's
information concerning him (torn. ii. p. 4/9). The account there given of
his writings is not much more satisfactory, and the criticism on them must
go for little better than nothing. It is to be regretted that we have not an op-
portunity of judging for ourselves of his " love ditties and his tales of prose."
Versi d'amore e prose di romanzi.
Our Poet frequently cites him in the work De Vulgari Eloquio. In the
•second chapter of the second book, he is instanced as one "who had treated
of love ; " and in the tenth chapter, he is said to have used in almost all his
canzoni a particular kind of stanza, the sestine, which Dante had followed in
one of his own canzoni, beginning,

Al poco giorno ed al gran cerchio d'ombra.
This stanza is termed by Gray, " both in sense and sound, a very mean com-
position." Gray's Works, 4to, Lond. 1814, vol. ii. p. 23. According to
Crescimbeni, {Delia Volg. Pocs. lib. 1. p. 7, ed. 1698,) he died in 1189.
Arnault Daniel was not soon forgotten ; for Ausias March, a Catalonian,
who was himself distinguished as a Provencal poet in the middle of the
fifteenth century, makes honourable mention of him in some verses, which are
quoted by Bastero in his Crusca Provenzale, ediz. Roma, 1724, p. 7"» :

Envers algous aco miracle par ; •

Mas sin's membram d'en Arnau Daniel

E de aquels que la terra los es vel,

Sabrem Amor vers nos que pot donar.

To some this seems a miracle to be ;

But if we Arnault Daniel call to mind,

And those beside, whom earthly veil doth bind,

We then the mighty power of love shall see.
Since this note was written, M. Raynouard has made us better acquainted
with the writings and history of the Provencal poets. 1 have much pleasure
in citing the following particulars respecting Arnault Daniel from his Choix
des Poesies des Troubadours, torn. ii. pp. 318, 319: "L'autorite de Dante
suffirait pour nous convaincre qu' Arnaud Daniel avait compose plusieurs
romans. Mais il reste une preuve positive de l'existence d'un roman d' Arnaud
Daniel ; c'est celui de Lancelot du Lac, dont la traduction fut faite, vers la
fin du treizieme siecle, en allemand, par Ulrich de Zatchitschoven, qui nomme
Arnaud Daniel coiume l'auteur original."'1 "Le Tasse, dans Tun de ses
ouvrages, b s'exprime en ces termes, au sujet des romans compost's par les
troubadours : E romanzi furono detti quei poemi, o piu tosto quelle istorie
favolose, che furono scritte nella lingua de' Provenzali o de' Castigliani ; le
quali non si scrivevano in versi, ma in prosa, come alcuni hanno osservato
prima da me, perch e Dante, parlaudo d'Arnaldo Daniello, disse :

Versi d'amore e prose di romanzi, etc.
"Enfin Pulci, dans son Morgante Maggiore, nomme Arnaud Daniel comme
auteur d'un roman de Renaud :

Dopo costui venne il famoso Arnaldo

Che molto diligentemente ha scritto,

E investigo le opre di Rinaldo,

De le gran cose che fece in Egitto, etc."

Morgante Maggiore, Canto xxvii. ott. 80.
See also Raynouard, torn. v. 30.
1 The songster of Limoges.'] Giraud de Borneil, of Sideuil, a castle in

Des extraits de cette traduction allemande ont ete publics.
Discorso sopra il parere fatto del Signor Fr. Patricio, etc. edit. fol.
torn. iv. p. 210.

8

114—124. PURGATORY, Caxto XXVI. 293

O'ertops him. Rumour 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,1 giving him the prize, till truth

By strength of numbers vanquish'd. If thou own

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 2

For dwellers in this world, where power to sin

Limoges. He was a Troubadour, much admired and caressed in his day, and
appears to have been in favour with the monarchs of Castile, Leon, Navarre,
and Arragon. Giraud is mentioned by Dante in a remarkable passage of the
De Vidg. Eloq. lib. 2. cap. ii. : "As man is endowed with a triple soul,
vegetable, animal, and rational, so he walks in a triple path. Inasmuch as he
is vegetable, he seeks utility, in which he has a common nature with plants ;
inasmuch as he is animal, he seeks for pleasure, in which he participates with
brutes ; inasmuch as he is rational, he seeks for honour, in which he is either
alone, or is associated with the angels. Whatever we do, appears to be done
through these three principles," etc. — "With respect to utility, we shall find
on a minute inquiry that the primary object with all who seek it, is safety ;
with regard to pleasure, love is entitled to the first place ; and as to honour,
no one will hesitate in assigning the same pre-eminence to virtue. These three
then, safety, love, virtue, appear to be three great subjects, which ought to be
treated with most grandeur ; that is, those things which chiefly pertain to
these, as courage in arms, ardency of love, and the direction of the will : con-
cerning which alone we shall find on inquiry that illustrious men have composed
their poems in the vernacular tongues ; Bertrand de Born, of arms ; Arnault
Daniel, of love ; Giraud de Bomeil, of rectitude ; Cino da Pistoia, of love ; his
friend," (by whom he means himself,) "of rectitude ; but I find no Italian as
yet who has treated of arms." Giraud is again quoted in the sixth chapter of
this book. The following notice respecting him is found in Gray's posthumous
Works, 4to, Lond. 1814, vol. ii. p. 23 : "The canzone is of very ancient date,
the invention of it being ascribed to Girard de Borneil of the school of Provence,
who died in 1178. He was of Limoges, and was called II Maestro de'
Trovatori." That he was distinguished by this title (a circumstance that,
perhaps, induced Dante to vindicate the superior claims of Arnault Daniel) is
mentioned by Bastero in his Crxisca Provenzale, ediz. Roma, p. 84, where we
find the following list of his MSS. poems preserved in the Vatican, and in the
library of S. Lorenzo at Florence : " Una tenzone col Re d'Aragona ; e un
Serventese contra Cardaillac, e diverse Canzoni massimamente tre pel ricupera-
mento del S. Sepolcro, o di Terra Santa, ed alcune col titolo di Canterete, cioe
picciole cantari, ovvero cauzonette." The light which these and similar
writings might cast, not only on the events, but still more on the manners of
a most interesting period of history, would surely, without taking into the
account any merit they may possess as poetical compositions, render them
objects well deserving of more curiosity than they appear to have hitherto
excited in the public mind. Many of his poems are still remaining in MS.
According to Nostradamus, he died in 1278. Millot, Hist. Litt. des Troub.
torn. ii. ]). 1 and 23. But I suspect that there is some error in this date, and
that be did not live to so late a period. Some of his poems have since been
published by Raynouard, Poesies des Troubadours, torn. hi. p. 304, etc.

1 Ouittone.'] See Canto xxiv. 56.

2 Far as needs.] See Canto xi. 23.

294 THE VISION 125-132.

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 1

1 Thy courtesy.'] Arnault is here made to speak in his own tongue, the
Provencal. According to Dante, {De Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap. viii, ) the Provencal
was one language with the Spanish. What he says on this subject is so
curious, that the reader will perhaps not be displeased if I give an abstract of
it. He first makes three great divisions of the European languages. " One of
these extends from the mouths of the Danube, or the lake of Maeotis, to the
western limits of England, and is bounded by the limits of the French and
Italians, and by the ocean. One idiom obtained over the whole of this space :
but was afterwards subdivided into the Sclavonian, Hungarian, Teutonic,
Saxon, English, and the vernacular tongues of several other people, one sign
remaining to all, that they use the affirmative io (our English ay). The whole
of Europe, beginning from the Hungarian limits and stretching towards the
east, has a second idiom, which reaches still further than the end of Europe,
into Asia. This is the Greek. In all that remains of Europe, there is a third
idiom, subdivided into three dialects, which may be severally distinguished by
the use of the affirmatives, oc, oil, and si ; the first spoken by the Spaniards,
the next by the French, the third by the Latins (or Italians). The first occupy
the western part of southern Europe, beginning from the limits of the Genoese.
The third occupy the eastern part from the said limits, as far, that is, as to the
promontory of Italy, where the Adriatic sea begins, and to Sicily. The second
an in a manner northern, with respect to these, for they have the Germans to
the east and north, on the west they are bounded by the English sea and the
mountains of Arragon, and on the south by the people of Provence and the
declivity of the Apenuine." Ibid. cap. x. "Each of these three," he observes,
"has its own claims to distinction. The excellency of the French language
consists in its being best adapted, on account of its facility and agreeableness,
to prose narration, (quicquid redactum, sive inventum est ad vulgare prosaicum,
suum est ;) and he instances the books compiled on the gests of the Trojans
and Romans, and the delightful Adventures of King Arthur, with many other
histories and works of instruction. The Spanish (or Provencal) may boast of
its having produced such as first cultivated in this, as in a more perfect and
sweet language, the vernacular poetry : among whom are Pierre d'Auvergne,
and others more ancient. The privileges of the Latin, or Italian, are two ;
first, that it may reckon for its own those writers who have adopted a more
sweet and subtile style of poetry, in the number of whom are Cino da Pistoia
and his friend ; and the next, that its writers seem to adhere to certain general
rules of grammar, and in so doing give it, in the opinion of the intelligent, a
very weighty pretension to preference." Since the last edition of this book, it
has appeared that Mr. Gray understood by the words " Grammatical, quae com-
munis est ;" "the Latin, or mother-tongue," and not, as I have rendered them,
"general rules of grammar." In this latter sense, however, the word " Gram-
matica" has been used twice before in the Treatise De Vvlg Eloq., though it
is certainly afterwards applied in the sense in which Gray took it. See the
edition of Gray's Works, for which we are so much indebted to Mr. Mathias,
4to, London, 1814, vol. ii. p. 35. We learn from our author's Vita JYitova,
p. 258, that there were no poetic compositions in the Provencal or Italian,
more than one hundred and fifty years before the Vita JVuova was written ; and
that the first who wrote in the vernacular languages, wrote to make himself

133—141 PURGATORY, Canto XXVII. 295

So wins on me, I have nor power nor will
To hide me. 1 am Arnault ; and with songs,
Sorely waymenting for my folly past,
Thorough 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.

Jtsgnmettt

An angel sends them forward through the fire to the last ascent, which leads
to the terrestrial Paradise, situated on the summit 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 contemplative life. With the return of morning, they

understood by a lady. M. Kaynouard supposed the text of all the editions to
be miserably corrupted in this place, and took much pains to restore it. I
will add the passage as that learned writer concluded it to have come from the
hand of Dante :

"Tan m'abellis vostre cortes deman,

Ch' ieu non me puese ni m voil a vos cobrire ;

Jeu sui Arnautz, clie plor e vai cantan ;

Consiros, vei la passada follor,

E vei jauzen lo joi qu'esper denan ;

Aras vos prec, per aquella valor

Que us guida al som sens freich e sens calina,

Sovegna vos atenprar ma dolor.

"Tant me plait votre courtoise demande,— que je ne puis ni ne me veux a
vous cacher ; — je suis Arnaud, qui pleure et va chantant ; — soucieux, je vois
la passee folie, — et vois joyeux le bonheur, que j'espere a l'avenir ; — maintenant
je vous prie, par cette vertu — qui vous guide au sommet, sans froid et sans
chaud ; — qu'il souvienne a vous de soulager ma douleur. II n'est pas un des
nombreux manuscrits de la Divina Corn/media, pas une des editions multiplies
qui en ont ete donnees, qui ne presente dans les vers que Dante prete au
troubadour Arnaud Daniel, un texte defigure et devenu, de copie en copie,
presque inintelligible. Cependant j'ai pens'' qu'il n'etait pas impossible de
retaolii le texte de ces vers, en comparant avec soin, dans les manuscrits de
Dante que possedent les depots publics de Paris, toutes les variantes qu'ils
pouvaient fournir, et en les choisissant d'apres les regies grammaticales et les
notions lexicographiques de la langue des troubadours. Mon espoir n'a point
<t('' trompe, et sans aucun secours conjectural, sans aucun deplacement ni
changement de mots, je suis parvenu, par le simple choix des variantes, a
retrouver le texte primitif, tel qu'il a du Otre produit par Dante." Kaynouard,
Lexique Roman, torn. i. p. 42, 8°, Par. 1830.

296 THE VISION. 1—32.

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.

Now was the sun J 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 2 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.3 My hands together clasp'd,
And upward stretching, on the fire I look'd ;
And busy fancy conjured up the forms
Ere while beheld alive consumed in flames.

The escorting spirits turn'd with gentle looks
Toward me ; and the Mantuan spake : " My son,
Here torment thou niayst 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 1
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,
Approacli ; and with thy hand 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."

1 The sun.] At Jerusalem it was dawn, in Spain midnight, and in India
noonday, while it was sunset in Purgatory.

2 Blessed.] Matt. v. 8.

3 As one

Laid in the grave.] Quale e colui che nella fossa e messo.

Lomhardi understands this of a man who is taken to execution in the manner
described in Hell, c. xix. 52. " Colui," he thinks, cannot be properly applied
to a corse. Yet Boccaccio's imitation confirms the opinion of the other com-
mentators :

Essa era tale, a guardarla nel viso,

Qual donna morta alia fossa portata. II Filostrato, p. v. st. 83.

which Chaucer has thus translated :

She was right soche to sene in her visage,

As is that Avight that men on here ybinde. Troilus and Creecide, b. 4.

33-78. PURGATORY, Canto XXVII. 297

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 ; x 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 Sta tius, 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 I 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,
" E'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," 2 we heard,
" Come, blessed of my Father." Such the sounds,
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 oithe 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 supper on the herb, now silent lie

1 While vermeil dyed the mulberry.] Ovid, Mctam. lib. 4. 125.

2 Come.] Matt. xxv. 34.

298 THE VISION 79—119.

And ruminate beneath the umbrage brown,
While noonday 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 alway glowing with the fire of love,
A lady young and beautiful, I dream'd,
Was passing o'er a lea ; and, as she came,
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 : l for my brow to weave
A garland, these fair hands unwearied ply.
To please me 2 at the crystal mirror, here
I deck me. But my sister Rachel, she 3
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 labour 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,

1 1 am Leah.] By Leah is understood the active life, as Rachel figures the
contemplative. Michael Angelo has. made these allegorical personages the
subject of two statues on the monument of Julius II. in the church of S. Pietro
in Vincolo. See Mr. Duppa's Life of Michael Angelo, Sculpture viii. and x.
and p. 247.

2 To please me.] " For the sake of that enjoyment which I shall have in he-
holding my God face to face, I thus exercise myself in good works."

3 She.] "Her delight is in admiring in her mirror, that is, in the Supreme
Being, the light, or knowledge, that He vouchsafes her."

120—143. PURGATORY, Canto XXVIII. 299

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

No 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'ercoine the straiter. Lo ! the sun that darts

His beam upon thy forehead : lo ! the herb,1

The arborets and flowers, which of itself

This land pours forth profuse. Till those bright eyes2

With gladness come, which, weeping, made me haste

To succour 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 arbitrement to chuse,

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 Paradise, till he is stopped
hy a stream, on the other side of which he beholds a fair lady, culling
flowers. He speaks to her; and 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 Eunoe.

Through 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

lLof the herb.] "In alinm campum transit amcenis.siinum. — Ipse vero
campus splendidus, suavis ac decorus quanta? magnitudinis, quantfe gloria*,
quantaeque sit pulchritudinis, nulla lingua, nullusque sermo, potest enarrare :
plenus est enim omni jucunditate, et gaudio, et laetitia. Ibi liliorum, et
rosarum odor, ibi odoramentorum omnium redolet fragrantia, ibi mannse, om-
niumque eternarum deliciarum redundat abundantia. In hujus campi medio
paradisus est." Alberici Visio, sec. 20.

2 Those bright eyes.] The eyes of Beatrice.

300 THE VISION. 6—33.

Pursuing, o'er the ground, that on all sides
Delicious odour breathed. A pleasant air,1
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 2
Where first the holy mountain casts his shade ;
Yet were not so disorder'd, but that still
Upon their top the feather'd quiristers 3
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 tenour ; even as from branch to branch,
Along the piny forests on the shore
Of Chiassi,4 rolls the gathering melody,
When Eolus hath from his cavern loosed
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 moon-light there to shine.

1 A pleasant air.]

Cantan fra i rami gli augelletti vaghi,

Azzurri, e bianchi, e verdi, e rossi, e gialli ;

Mormoranti ruscelli, e cheti laglji

Di limpidezza vineono i cristalli.

Una dole' aura, elie ti par che vaghi

A un modo senipre, e dal suo stil non falli,

Facea si l'aria tremolar d'intorno,

Che non potea nqjar calor del giorno.

Ariosto, Orl. Fur. c. xxxiv. st. 50.
Therewith a winde, unnethe it might be less,
Made in the levis grene a noise soft,
Accordant to the foulis song on loft.

Chaucer, The Assemble of Foules.

2 To that part] The west.

3 The feather'd quiristers.] Imitated by 'Boccaccio, Fiammetta, lib. 4. :
11 Odi i queruli uccelli," etc. — " Hear the querulous birds plaining with sweet
songs, and the boughs trembling, and, moved by a gentle wind, as it were
keeping tenour to their notes."

4 Chiassi.] This is the wood, where the scene of Boccaccio's sublimest
story (taken entirely from Elinaud, as I learn in the Notes to the Decameron,
ediz. Giunti, 1573, p. 62) is laid. See Dec. G. v. N. 8, and Dryden's
Theodore and, Honoria. Our Poet perhaps wandered in it during his abode
with Guido Novello da Polenta.

34—71. PURGATORY, Canto XXVIII. 301

My feet advanced not ; but my wondering eyes
Pass'd onward, o'er the streamlet, to survey
The tender may-bloom, iiush'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 l 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 towards 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
Valing her sober eyes ; and came so near,
That I distinctly caught the dulcet sound.
Arriving where the limpid waters now
Laved the green swerd, her eyes she deign'd to raise,
That shot such splendour 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 for ever to the pride of man,2)

1 A lady.] Most of the commentators suppose, that by this lady, who in
the last Canto is called Matilda, is to be understood the Countess Matilda,
who endowed the holy see with the estates called the Patrimony of St. Peter,
and died in 1115. See G. Villani, lib. 4. cap. xx. But it seems more
probable that she should be intended for an allegorical personage. Venturi
accordingly supposes that she represents the active life. But, as Lombardi
justly observes, we have had that already shadowed forth in the character of
Leah ; and he therefore suggests, that by Matilda may be understood that
affection which we ought to bear towards the holy church, and for which the
lady above mentioned was so remarkable.

2 A curb for ever to the pride of man.] Because Xerxes had been so
humbled, when he was compelled to repass the Hellespont in one small bark,

302 THE VISION. 72—113.

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,
1 Thou, Lord ! hast made me glad,' x 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 2
To reconcile this wave, and rustling sound
Of forest leaves, with what I late have heard
Of opposite report." She answering thus :
" I will unfold the cause, whence that proceeds,
Which makes thee wonder ; and so purge the cloud
That hath en wrapt 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.
Favour'd thus highly, through his own defect
He fell ; and here made short sojourn ; he fell,
And, for the bitterness of sorrow, changed
Laughter unblamed and ever-new delight.
That vapours 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 ; 3 froni 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,

after having a little before crossed with a prodigious army, in the topes of
subduing Greece.

1 Thou, Lord ! hast made me glad.] Psalm xcii. 4.

2 I know not how.] See Canto xxi. 45.

3 Of elements contending.] In the Dittamondo of Fazio degli Uberti, lib. 1.
cap. xi., there is a description of the terrestrial Paradise, in which the poet
has had Dante before him.

114—149 PURGATORY, Canto XXVIII. 303

That it impregnates with its efficacy

The voyaging breeze, upon whose subtle pluinr

That, wafted, flies abroad ; and the other land,1

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 vapour, that the cold converts ;
As stream that intermittently repairs
And spends his pulse of life ; but issues forth
From fountain, solid, undecaying, sure :
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, Eunoe : both of which must first
Be tasted, ere it work ; the last exceeding
All flavours 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,2 of this place
Perhaps had dream'd. Here was man guiltless ; here
Perpetual spring,3 and every fruit ; and this

1 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.

2 On the Parnassian mountain.]

In bicipiti somniasse Parnasso. Persius, Prol.

3 Perpetual spring.]

Ver erat aeternum, placidique tepentibus auris
Mulcebant zephyri natos sine semine flores.

Flumina jam lactis, jam flumina nectaris ibant.

Ovid, Metam. lib. 1. v. 111.

304 THE VISION. 150—153.

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.

Singing,1 as if enamour'd, she resumed

And closed the song, with " Blessed they 2 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,
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 splendour, 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

1 Singing.] Cantava come fosse innamorata.

Guido Cavalcanti, Poeti del primo secolo, vol. ii. p. 283.

2 Blessed they.] Psalm xxxii. 1.

30— C'5. PURGATORY, Canto XXIX. 305

That never fade, suspense I walk'd, and yet

Kxpectant 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.

0 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
Remotely, plays on the misdeeming sense ;
Then did the faculty, that ministers
Discourse to reason, these for tapers of gold 2
Distinguish ; and i' the singing trace the sound
" Hosanna." Above, their beauteous garniture
Flamed with more ample lustre, than the moon
Through cloudless sky at midnight, in her noon.

1 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 towards us, that the bride 3
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 1 "

I straightway mark'd a tribe behind them walk,
As if attendant on their leaders, clothed
With raiment of such whiteness, as on earth

1 Urania.'] Landino observes, that intending to sing of heavenly things, he
rightly invokes Urania. Thus Milton :

Descend from Heaven, Urania, by that name

If rightly thou art call'd. P. L. b. 7. 1.

2 Tapers of gold.] See Rev. i. 12. The commentators are not agreed
whether the seven sacraments of the church, or the seven gifts of the Spirit
are intended. In his Convito, our author says : "Because these gifts proceed
from ineffable charity, and divine charity is appropriated to the Holy Spirit,
hence, also, it is that they are called gifts of the Holy Spirit, the which, as
Isaiah distinguishes them, are seven." P. 189.

3 The bride] E come va per via sposa novella

A passi rari, e porta gli occhi bassi
Con faccia vergognosa, e non favella.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 1. cap. xvi.
U

306 THE VISION. 66—89.

"Was never. On my left, the watery gleam
Borrow'd, and gave me back, when there 1 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,1 as they went,
The air behind them painted as with trail
Of liveliest pencils ; 2 so distinct were mark'd
All those seven listed colours,3 whence the sun
Maketh his bow, and Cynthia her zone.
These streaming gonfalons did flow beyond
My vision ; and ten paces,4 as I guess,'
Parted the outermost. Beneath a sky
So beautiful, came four and twenty elders,5
By two and two, with flower-de-luces crown'd.
All sang one song : " Blessed be thou 6 among
The daughters of Adam ! and thy loveliness
Blessed for ever ! " 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.

1 Leaving. ] Lasciaudo dietro a se l'aer dipinto.

Che lascia dietro a se l'aria clipinta.
Mr. Mathias's Ode to Mr. ffichou, Gray's Works, vol. i. p. 532.

2 Pencils.] Since this translation was made, Perticari has affixed another
sense to the word " pennelli," which he interprets " pennons " or " streamers."
Monti, In his Proposta, highly applauds the discovery. The conjecture loses
something of its probability, if we read the whole passage, not as Monti gives
it, but as it stands in Landino's edition of 1484 :

Et vidi le fiamelle andar davante N

lasciando drieto a se laire dipinto

che di tratti pennegli havea sembiante
Siche li sopra rimanea distinto

di sette liste tutte in que colori

onde fa larcho el sole & delia elcinto.

3 Listed colours.'] Di sette liste tutte in quei colori, etc.

a bow

Conspicuous with three listed colours gay. Milton, P. L. b. 11. 865.

4 Ten paces.] For an explanation of the allegorical meaning of this mys-
terious procession, Venturi refers those, "who would see in the dark," to the
commentaries of Landino, Vellutello, and others : and adds, that it is evident
the Poet has accommodated to his own fancy many sacred images in the
Apocalypse. In Vassari's Life of Giotto, we learn that Dante recommended
that book to his friend, as affording fit subjects for his pencil.

5 Four and txcenty elders.] " Upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders
sitting." Rev. iv. 4.

6 Blessed be thou.] "Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the
fruit of thy womb." Luke, i. 42.

7 Four.] The four evangelists.

90—112. PURGATORY, Canto XXIX. 307

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 j1 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 : i there,
From him departing, John 2 accords with me.
The space, surrounded by the four, enclosed
A car triumphal : 3 on two wheels it came,
Drawn at a Gryphon's 4 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 5
A car, in Rome, ne'er graced Augustus' pomp,
Or Africanus' : e'en the sun's itself

1 Ezekiel.] "And I looked, and behold, a whirlwind came out of the north,
a great cloud, and a fire infolding itself, and a brightness was about it, and out
of the midst thereof as the colour of amber, out of the midst of the fire. Also
out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures. And this
was their appearance ; they had the likeness of a man. And every one had
four faces, and every one had four wings." Ezekiel, i. 4, 5, 6.

2 John.] "And the four beasts had each of them six wings about him."
Rev. iv. 8. "Aliter senas alas propter senarii numeri perfectionem positum
arbitror ; quia in sexta setate, id est adveniente plenitudine temporum, hrec
Apostolus peracta commemorat ; in novissimo enim animali conclusit omnia."
l'rhnasii, Augustini discipuli, Episcopi Comment, lib. quinque in Apocal. ed.
Basil, 1544. " With this interpretation it is very consonant that Ezekiel
discovered in these animals only four wings, because his prophecy does not
extend beyond the fourth age ; beyond that is the end of the synagogue and
the calling of the Gentiles : whereas Dante beholding them in the sixth age,
saw them with six wings, as did Saint John." Lombardi.

3 A car triumphal.'] Either the Christian church, or perhaps the Papal
chair.

4 Gryphon.] Under the gryphon, an imaginary creature, the fore-part of
which is an eagle, and the hinder a lion, is shadowed forth the union of the
divine and human nature in Jesus Christ.

6 So beautiful.'] E certo quando Roma piu onore
Di carro trionfale a Scipione
Fece, non fu cotal, ne di splendore
Passato fu da quello, il qual Fetone
Abbandono per soverchio tremore.

Boccaccio, Teseide, lib. 9. st. 31.
Thus in the Qitadriregio, lib. 1. cap. v.:

Mai vide Roma carro trionfante

Quanto era questo bel, ne vedra unquanco.

308 THE VISION. 113—140.

Were poor to this ; that chariot of the sun,
Erroneous, which in blazing rum fell
At Tellus' prayer * devout, by the just doom
Mysterious of all-seeing Jove Three nymphs,2
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,3 each in purple clad,
Advanced with festal step, as, of them, one
The rest conducted ; 4 one, upon whose front
Three eyes were seen. In rear of all this group,
Two old men 6 I beheld, dissimilar
In raiment, but in port and gesture like,
Solid and mainly grave ; of whom, the one
Did show himself some favour'd counsellor
Of the great Coan,6 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 7 I beheld,
Of humble seeming : and, behind them all,
One single old man,8 sleeping as he came,

I Tellus' pra>jer.] Ovid, Met. lib. 2. v. 279.

8 Three nymphs.] The three evangelical 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.

3 A band quaternion.'] The four moral or cardinal virtues, of whom
Prudence directs the others.

4 One

The rest conducted.] Prudence, described with three eyes, because she
regards the past, the present, and the future.

5 Two old men.] Saint Luke, the physician, characterized as the writer of
the Acts of the Apostles, and Saint Paul, represented with a sword, on account,
as it should seem, of the power of his style.

6 Of the great Coan.] Hippocrates, "whom nature made for the benefit of
her favourite creature, man."

7 Four others.] "The commentators," says Venturi, "suppose these four
to be the four evangelists ; but I should rather take them to be four principal
doctors of the church." Yet both Landino and Vellutello expressly call them
the authors of the epistles, James, Peter, John, and Jude.

8 One single old man.] As some say, Saint John, under his character of the
author of the Apocalypse. But, in the poem attributed to Giacopo, the son of
our Poet, which in some MSS. and in one of the earliest editions, accompanies
the original of this work, and is descriptive of its plan, this old man is said to
be Moses :

141—150. PURGATORY, Canto XXX. 309

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,
That they were all on fire x above their brow.

Whenas 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.

3kattment.

Beatrice descends from heaven, and rebukes the Poet.

Soon as that polar light,2 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,3 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

E'l vecchio, ch' era dietro a tutti loro,

Fu Moyse.

And the old man, who was behind them all,

See No. 3459 of the Harl. MSS. in the British Museum,
i All on fire.] So Giles Fletcher :

The wood's late wintry head
With flaming primroses set all on fire.

Christ's Triumph after Death.
That polar light.'] The seven candlesticks of gold, which he calls the
polar 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 Lebanon, my spouse, with me, from
Lebanon." Song of Solomon, iv. 8.

310 THE VISION. 19-38.

Of life eternal. " Blessed 1 thou, who comest ! "
And, " Oh ! " they cried, " from full hands 2 scatter ye
Unwithering lilies : " and, so saying, cast
Flowers overhead 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 snaded, and with mists
Attemper'd, at his rising, that the eye
Long while endured the sight : thus, in a cloud
Of flowers,3 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 appear'd, beneath *
Green mantle, robed in hue of living flame :
And 4 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 5 was strong within me.

1 Blessed.] " Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord." Matt. xxi. 9.

2 From full hands.'] Manibus date lilia plenis. Virg. ^n. lib. 6. 884.
3 In a cloud

Of flowers.] Dentro una nuvola di fiori.

ninguntque rosarum.

Floribus, umbrantes matrem, etc. Lucretius, lib. 2.
Thus Milton :

Eve separate he spies,

Veil'd in a cloud of fragrance, where she stood. P. L. b. 0. v. 425.
And Thomson, in his Invocation to Spring :

veil'd in a shower

Of shadowing roses, on our plains descend.

4 And.] In the first edition it stood thus :

And o'er my spirit, that in former days
Within her presence had abode so long,
No shuddering terror crept. Mine eyes no more
Had knowledge of her ; yet there moved from her
A hidden virtue, at whose touch awaked, etc.
and this was a translation of the common reading, which has "con la sua
presenza," instead of "che alia sua presenza," and a full stop instead of a
comma after "infranto." As I have little doubt but that the reading of the
Nidobeatina edition and that of many MSS. is right in this instance, I have
altered the version as it now stands in the text, which still perhaps needs
some explanation. His spirit, which had been so long unawed by the presence
of Beatrice (for she had been ten years dead) now felt, through a secret in-
fluence proceeding from her, its ancient love revived, though his sight had
not yet distinguished her.

5 The }}ower of ancient love.]

D'antico amor senti la gran potenza.
Io sento si d'amor la gran possanza.

Dante, Canzone vi.
Sveglia d'antico amor la gran possanza.

Mr. Mathias's Ode to Mr. Nichols, Gray's Works,
4to, 1814, vol. i. p. 532.

39—83. PURGATORY, Canto XXX. 311

No sooner on my vision streaming, smote
The heavenly influence, which, years past, and e'en
In childhood, thrill'd me, than towards Virgil I
Turn'd me to leftward ; panting, like a babe,
That flees for refuge to his mother's breast,
If aught have terrified or work'd him woe :
And would have cried, " There is no dram of blood,
That doth not quiver in me. The old flame 1
Throws out clear tokens of reviving fire."
But Virgil had bereaved us of himself ;
Virgil, my best-loved father ; Virgil, he
To whom I gave me up for safety : nor 2
All, our prime mother lost, avail'd to save
My undew'd cheeks from blur of soiling tears.

" Dante ! weep not, that Virgil leaves thee ; nay,
Weep 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
(Turning me at the sound of mine own name,
Which here I am compell'd to register)
The virgin station'd, who before appear'd
Veil'd in that festive shower angelical.

Towards me, across the stream, she bent her eyes ;
Though from her brow the veil descending, bound
With foliage of Minerva, suffer'd not
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, 0 man !
Thy happiness is here ? " Down fell mine eyes
On the clear fount ; but there, myself espying,
Recoil'd, and sought the greenswerd ; 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 flavour of such bitterness
Was mingled in her pity. There her words
Brake off ; and suddenly the angels sang,
" In thee, 0 gracious Lord ! my hope hath been : *

1 The old flame.] Agnosco veteris vestigia flammse. Virg. JEn. lib. 4. 23.

Conosco i segni dell' antico fuoco. Giusto de' Conti, La Bella Mano.

2 Nor."] " Nor all the beauties of the terrestrial Paradise, in which I was,
were sufficient to allay my grief."

312 THE VISION. 84-119.

But * went no further than, " Thou, Lord ! hast set

My feet in ample room." As snow, that lies,

Amidst the living rafters 2 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,3

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 rio consumest him I" then, the ice,4

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 6 still she stood,
Immoveable ; and thus address'd her words
To those bright semblances with pity touch'd :
" Ye in the eternal day your vigils keep ;
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,6 such,
So gifted virtually, that in him
All better habits wonderously had thrived.

1 But.] They sang the thirty-first Psalm, to the end of the eighth verse.
What follows in that Psalm would not have suited the place or the occasion.

2 The living rafters.] "Vive travi." The leafless woods on the Apennine.

Fraxineaeque trabes. Virg. JEn. lib. 6. 181.

and Trabibusque obscurus acernis. Ibid. lib. 9. 87.

3 The land whereon no shadoio falls.] " When the wind blows from off
Africa, where, at the time of the equinox, bodies, being under the equator,
cast little or no shadow ; or, in other words, when the wind is south."

* The ice.] Milton has transferred this conceit, though scarcely worth the
pains of removing, into one of his Italian poems, Son. v.

5 Same edge.] The Nidobeatina edition, and many MSS. here read " detfa
coscia," instead of " destra," or " dritta coscia ; " and it is probable from what
has gone before, that the former is the right reading. See v. 60.

6 In the freshness of his being.] Nella sua vita nuova.

Some suppose our Poet alludes to the work so called, written in his youth.

120—146. PURGATORY, Canto XXXI. 313

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,1 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,

If Lethe should be past, and such food 2 tasted,

Without the cost of some repentant tear."

CANTO XXXI.

Argument.

Beatrice continues her reprehension of Dante, who confesses 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.

" 0 thou ! " her words she thus without delay
Resuming, turn'd their point on me, to whom

1 The threshold of my second age.] In the Convito, our Poet makes a
division of human life into four ages, the first of which lasts till the twenty-
fifth year. Beatrice, therefore, passed from this life to a better, about that
period. See the Life of Dante prefixed.

2 Such food.'] The oblivion of sins.

314 THE VISION. 3—47.

They, with but lateral edge,3 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 1 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
Of further progress ? or what bait of ease,
Or promise of allurement, led thee on
Elsewhere, that thou elsewhere shouldst rather wait ? n

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.1
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 Syren- 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,

3 With but lateral edge.'] The words of Beatrice, when not addressed directly
to himself, but spoken to the angel of him, Dante had thought sufficiently harsh.

1 Counter to the edge.~\ " The weapons of divine justice are blunted by the
confession and sorrow of the offender."

48-72. PURGATORY, Canto XXXI. 315

As were the limbs that in their beauteous frame

Enclosed me, and are scatter'd now in dust.

If sweetest thing thus i'ail'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,1

Or other gaud as transient and as vain.

The new and inexperienced bird 2 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."

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,3
Than I at her behest my visage raised :
And thus the face denoting by the beard,4
I mark'd the secret sting her words convey'd.

No sooner lifted I mine aspect up,

1 For a slight girl.'] " Daniello and Venturi say that this alludes to
Gentucca of Lucca, mentioned in the twenty-fourth Canto. They did not,
however, observe that Buonaggiunta there gives us to understand that Dante
knew not if Gentucca were then in the world, and that Beatrice is now repre-
hending him for past and not for future errors." Thus Lombardi. Pelli
{Manor, p. 57) acquaints us that Corhinelli, in the Life of Dante, added to the
edition of the De Vidg. Eloq., says the name of this lady was " Pargoletta."
But the intimation, as Pelli justly remarks, can scarcely be deemed authentic.
The annotator on the Monte Casino MS. gives a very different turn to the
allusion. "Quae proca fuit," etc. "This was either a mistress : or else it is
put for the poetic art, as when he says in a certain song :

lo mi son pargoletta bella e nuova
E son venuta.
which rebuke of Beatrice's may be delivered in the person of many theologians
dissuading from poetry and other worldly sciences ; a rebuke that should be
directed against those who read the poets to gratify their own inclination, and
not for the sake of instruction, that they may defeat the errors of the Gentiles."
It remains to be considered whether our Poet's marriage with Gemma de'
Donati, and the difficulties in which that engagement involved him, may not
be the object of Beatrice's displeasure.

2 Bird.] " Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird." Prov.
i. 17.

3 From Iarbas' land.] The south.

4 The beard.] " I perceived, that when she desired me to raise my beard,
instead of telling me to lift up my head, a severe reflection was implied on my
want of that wisdom which should accompany the age of manhood."

316 THE VISION. 74-109.

Than I perceived 1 those primal creatures cease

Their flowery sprinkling ; and mine eyes beheld

(Yet unassured and wavering in their view)

Beatrice ; she, who towards 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 beguil'd 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,2 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," 3 that I
May not remember, much less tell the sound.

The beauteous dame, her arms expanding, clasp'd
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.4 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

1 Than I perceived.'] I had before translated this differently, and in agree-
ment with those editions, which read,

Posarsi quelle belle creature

Da loro apparsion.
instead of Posarsi quelle prime creature

Da loro aspersion,
for which reading I am indebted to Lombardi, who derives it from the Nido-
beatina edition. By the " primal creatures" are meant the angels, who Were
scattering the flowers on Beatrice.

2 The lady.] Matilda.

3 Tu asperges me.] " Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean ; wash me,
and I shall be whiter than snow." Ps. li. 7. Sung by the choir, while the
priest is sprinkling the people with holy water.

4 And in the heaven are stars.] See Canto i. 24.

110—146. PURGATORY, Canto XXXI. 317

Of gladness, that is in them, well to scan,

Those yonder three,1 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,2 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 twyfold being shone ;

For ever varying, in one figure now

Reflected, now in other. Reader ! muse

How wondrous in my sight it seem'd, to mark

A thing, albeit stedfast 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
Unveil to him thy cheeks ; that he may mark
Thy second beauty, now conceal'd." O splendour
O sacred light eternal ! who is he,
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 1

1 Those yonder three.'] Faith, Hope, and Charity.

2 The emeralds.] The eyes of Beatrice. The author of Illustrations of
Shakspeare, 8vo, 1807, vol. ii. p. 193, has referred to old writers, by whom the
epithet green is given to eyes, as by the early French -poets/and by Shakspeare,
Jiomeo and Juliet, act iii. sc. 5 :

an eagle, madam,

Hath not so green, so quick, so fair an eye.
Mr. Douce's conjecture, that eyes of this colour are much less common now
than formerly, is not so probable as that writers, and especially poets, should
at times be somewhat loose and general in applying terms expressive of colour,
whereof an instance may be seen in some ingenious remarks by Mr. Blomfield
on the word xvxnoi. jEschyli Persce. edit. 1814, Glossar. p. 107.

318 THE VISION. 1—32.

CANTO XXXII.

Jtraumcnt.

Dante is warned not to gaze too fixedly on Beatrice. The procession moves on,
accompanied by Matilda, Statius, and Dante, till they reach an exceeding
lofty tree, where divers strange chances befal.

Mine eyes with sucli an eager coveting

Were bent to rid them of their ten years' thirst,1

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 ! " 2

Awhile my vision labour'd ; as when late
Upon the o'erstrained eyes the sun hath smote :
But soon,3 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
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 beguil'd,) I pass'd,
With step in cadence to the harmony

1 Their ten years' thirst.] Beatrice had been dead ten years.

2 Too fix'd a gaze.] The allegorical interpretation of Vellutello, whether it
be considered as justly inferrible from the text or not, conveys so useful a
lesson, that it deserves our notice. "The understanding is sometimes so
intently engaged in contemplating the light of divine truth in the Scriptures,
that it becomes dazzled, and is made less capable of attaining such knowledge,
than if it had sought after it with greater moderation."

3 But soon.] As soon as his sight was recovered, so as to bear the view of
that glorious procession, which, splendid as it was, was yet less so than
Beatrice, by whom his vision had been overpowered, etc.

33—54. PURGATORY, Canto XXXII. 319

Angelic. Onward had we moved, as far,

Perchance, as arrow at three several flights

Full winffd had sped, when from her station down

Descended Beatrice. With one voice

All murmur'd " Adam ; " circling next a plant 1

Despoil'd of flowers and leaf, on every bough.

Its tresses,2 spreading more as more they rose,

Were such, as 'midst their forest wilds, for height,

The Indians 3 might have gazed at. " Blessed thou,

Gryphon ! 4 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 5 whereon it grew.

As when large floods of radiance 6 from above
Stream, with that radiance mingled, which ascends
Next after setting of the scaly sign,
Our plants then burgein, and each wears anew

1 A plant.] Lombardi has conjectured, with much probability, that this
tree is not (as preceding commentators had supposed) merely intended to
represent the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but that the Roman empire
is figured by it. Among the maxims maintained by our Poet, as the same
commentator observes, were these : that one monarchy had been willed by
Providence, and was necessary for universal peace ; and that this monarchy,
by right of justice and by the divine ordinance belonged to the Roman people
only. His Treatise De Monarchic, was written indeed to inculcate these
maxims, and to prove that the temporal monarchy depends immediately on
God, and should be kept as distinct as possible from the authority of the pope.

2 Its tresses.] " I saw, and behold, a tree in the midst of the earth, and the
height thereof was great." Daniel, iv. 10.

3 The Indians.]

Quos oceano proprior gerit India lucos.

Virg. Georg. lib. 2. 122.

Such as at this day to Indians known.

Milton, P. L. b. 9. 1102.

Blessed thou,

Gryphon !] Our Saviour's submission to the Roman empire appears to be
intended, and particularly his injunction, "to render unto Caesar the things
that are Caesar's."

5 There, left unto the stock.] Dante here seems, I think, to intimate what
he has attempted to prove at the conclusion of the second book De Monarchic ;
namely, that our Saviour, by his suffering under the sentence, not of Herod,
but of Pilate who was the delegate of the Roman emperor, acknowledged and
confirmed the supremacy of that emperor over the whole world ; for if, as he
argues, all mankind were become sinners through the sin of Adam, no punish-
ment, that was inflicted by one who had a right of jurisdiction over less than
the whole human race, could have been sufficient to satisfy for the sins of all
men. See Note to Paradise, c. vi. 89.

8 Mlien large floods of radiance.] When the sun enters into Aries, the con-
stellation next to that of the Fish.

320 THE VISION. 55— 96.

His "wonted colours, ere the sun Lave 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

To pencil forth how closed the unpitying eyes x

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 splendour rent

The curtain of my sleep, and one cries out,

" Arise : what dost thou 1 " As the chosen three,

On Tabor's mount, admitted to behold

The blossoming of that fair tree,2 whose fruit

Is coveted of angels, and doth make

Perpetual feast in heaven ; to themselves

Returning, at the word whence deeper sleeps 8

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,4 who, cross the stream, had brought

My steps. " And where," all doubting, I exclaim'd,

" Is Beatrice 1 " — " See her," she replied,

" Beneath the fresh leaf, seated on its root.

Behold the associate choir, 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 to the twyform beast. The seven nymphs

Did make themselves a cloister round about her ;

1 The vnrntying eyes.] See Ovid, Met. lib. 1. 689.

2 Tlie blossoming of that fair tree.] Our Saviour's transfiguration. "As the
apple-tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons."
Solomon's Song, ii. 3.

3 Deeper sleeps.] The sleep of death, in the instance of the ruler of the
synagogue's daughter and of Lazarus.

4 The piteous one.] Matilda.

97-135. PURGATORY, Canto XXXII. 321

And, in their hands, upheld those lights l secure
From blast septentrion and the gusty south.

"A little while thou shalt be forester here ;
And citizen shalt be, for ever with me,
Of that true Rome,2 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." 3

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 farthest bound,
As I beheld the bird of Jove 4 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 5 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 : °
And then a voice, like that which issues forth
From heart with sorrow rived, did issue forth
From heaven, and, " 0 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 7 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
Part of the bottom forth ; and went his way,
Exulting. What remain'd, as lively turf

1 Those lights.] The tapers of gold.

2 Of that true Rome.'] Of heaven.

3 To that place.] To the earth.

4 The bird of Jove.] This, which is imitated from Ezekiel, xvii. 3, 4, is
typical of the persecutions which the church sustained from the Koman
emperors.

5 A fox.] By the fox prohably is represented the treachery of the heretics.

6 With his feathers lined.] In allusion to the donations made by Constantine
to the church.

7 A dragon.] Probably Mahomet ; for what Lombardi offers to the contrary
is far from satisfactory.

X

322 THE VISION. 136—157.

With green herb, so did clothe itself with plumes,1

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 ; 2 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 it3 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 ner 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 dragg^ on,4 so far across

The forest, that from me its shades alone

Shielded the harlot and the new-form'd brute.

CANTO XXXIII.

QxQumznL

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 Eunoe, separating, flow different ways ; and Ma-
tilda, at the desire of Beatrice, causes our Poet to drink of the latter stream.

" The heathen,5 Lord ! are come : " responsive thus,
The trinal now, and now the virgin band

1 With plumes.] The increase of wealth and temporal dominion, which
followed the supposed gift of Constantine.

2 Heads.] By the seven heads, it is supposed with sufficient probability,
are meant the seven capital sins : by the three with two horns, pride, anger,
and avarice, injurious both to man himself and to his neighbour : by the four
with one horn, gluttony, gloominess, concupiscence, and envy, hurtful, at
least in their primary effects, chiefly to him who is guilty of them. Vellutello
refers to Rev. xvii. Landino, who is followed by Lombardi, understands the
seven heads to signify the seven sacraments, and the ten horns the ten com-
mandments. Compare Hell, c. xix. 112.

3 O'er it.] The harlot is thought to represent the state of the church under
Boniface VIII. and the giant to figure Philip IV. of France.

4 Dragg'd on.] The removal of the Pope's residence from Rome to Avignon
is pointed at.

5 The heathen.] "0 God, the heathen are come into thine inheritance."
Psalm lxxix. 1.

3-38. PURGATORY, Canto XXXIII. 323

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 colour glowing bright as fire,

Did answer : "Yet a little while,1 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,2 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 encounter'd ; 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 1 " Like to those
Who, speaking with too reverent an awe
Before their betters, draw not forth the voice
Alive unto their lips, befel me then
That I in sounds imperfect thus began :
" Lady ! what I have need of, that thou know'st ;
And what will suit my need." She answering thus :
" Of fearfulness and shame, I will that thou
Henceforth do rid thee ; that thou speak no more,
As one who dreams.3 Thus far be taught of me :
The vessel which thou saw'st the serpent break,
Was, and is not : 4 let him, who hath the blame,
Hope not to scare God's vengeance with a sop.5
Without an heir for ever shall not be
That eagle,6 he, who left the chariot plumed,

1 Yet a little xohile.] " A little while, and ye shall not see me ; and again a
little while, and ye shall see me." John, xvi. 16.

2 That remaining sage.] Statius.

3 As one who dreams.] Imitated by Petrarch, L. i. s. 41.

Se parole fai,

Sono imperfette e quasi d'uom che sogna.

4 Was, and is not.] " The beast that was, and is not." Rev. xvii. 11.

5 Hope not to scare God's vengeance with a sop.] "Let not him who hath
occasioned the destruction of the church, that vessel which the serpent brake,
hope to appease the anger of the Deity by any outward acts of religious, or
rather superstitious ceremony ; such as was that, in our Poet's time, performed
by a murderer at Florence, who imagined himself secure from vengeance, if he
ate a sop of bread in wine upon the grave of the person murdered, within the
space of nine days."

6 That eagle.] He prognosticates that the Emneror of Germany will not

324 THE VISION. 39—61.

Which monster made it first and next a prey.

Plainly I view, and therefore speak, the stars

E'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 ere long

Events shall be the Naiads,1 that will solve

This knotty riddle ; and no damage light 2

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 3 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 4

always continue to submit to the usurpations of the Pope, and foretels the
coining of Henry VII. Duke of Luxemburgh, signified by the numerical figures
DVX ; or, as Lombardi supposes, of Can Grande della Scala, appointed the
leader of the Ghibelline forces. It is unnecessary to point out the imitation
of the Apocalypse in the manner of this prophecy. Troya assigns reasons for
applying the prediction to Uguccione della Faggiola rather than to Henry or
Can Grande. Veltro Allegorico di Dante, ediz. 1826, p. 143. But see my
Note, //. i; 102.

1 The Naiads."] Dante, it is observed, has been led into a mistake by a
corruption in the text of Ovid's Metam. lib. 7. 757, where he found —

Carmina Naiades nou intellecta priorum

Solvunt.
instead of Carmina Laiades non intellecta priorum

Solverat.
as it has been since corrected by Heinsius. Lombardi, after Rosa Morando,
questions the propriety of this emendation, and refers to Pausanius, where
" the Nymphs" are spoken of as expounders of oracles, for a vindication of the
poet's accuracy. Should the reader blame me for not departing from the error
of the original, (if error it be,) he may substitute

Events shall be the GSdipus will solve, etc.

2 iVb damage light.'] Protinus Aoniis immissa est bellua Thebis,

Cessit et exitio multis ; pecorique sibique
Ruricolaj pavere feram. Ovid, ibid.

3 Twice.] First by the eagle and next by the giant. See the last Canto,
v. 110 and v. 154.

4 Five thousand years.] That such was the opinion of the church, Lombardi
shows by a reference to Baronius. Martyr. Rom. Dec. 25. Anno a creatione
mundi, quando a principio creavit Deus ccelum et terram, quinquies millesimo
centesimo nonagesimo— Jesus Christus — conceptus. Edit. Col. Agripp. 4to,
1610, p. 858.

62—84. PURGATORY, Canto XXXIII. 325

And upward, the first soul did yearn for him
Who punish'd in himself the fatal gust.

" Thy reason slumbers, if it deem this height,
And summit thus inverted,1 of the plant,
Without due cause : and were not vainer thoughts,
As Elsa's numbing waters,2 to thy soul,
And their fond pleasures had not dyed it dark
As Pyramus the mulberry ; thou hadst seen,3
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." 4

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 1 " — " To the end
That thou mayst know," she answer'd straight, " the school,

1 Inverted.] The branches, unlike those of other trees, spreading more
widely the higher they rose. See the last Canto, v. 39.

2 Elsa's numbing xvaters.] The Elsa, a little stream, which flows into the
Arno about twenty miles below Florence, is said to possess a petrifying quality.
Fazio degli Uberti, at the conclusion of cap. viii. lib. 3. of the Dittamondo,
mentions a successful experiment he had himself made of the property here
attributed to it.

3 Thou hadst seen.] This is obscure. But it would seem as if he meant to
inculcate his favourite doctrine of the inviolability of the empire, and of the
care taken by Providence to protect it.

4 That one brings home his staff inwreathed with palm.] " For the same
cause that the palmer, returning from Palestine, brings home his staff, or
bourdon, bound with palm," that is, to show where he has been.

Che si reca '1 bordon di palma cinto.

" It is to be understood," says our Poet in the Vita Nuova, " that people, who
go on the service of the Most High, are probably named in three ways. They
are named palmers, inasmuch as they go beyond sea, from whence they often
bring back the palm. Inasmuch as they go to the house of Galicia, they are
called pilgrims ; because the sepulchre of St. James was further from his
country than that of any other Apostle. They are called Romei," (for which
I know of no other word we have in English except Roamers,) "inasmuch as
tl\ey go to Rome." P. 275. " In regard to the word bourdon, why it has been
applied to a pilgrim's staff, it is not easy to guess. I believe, however, that
this name has been given to such sort of staves, because pilgrims usually travel
and perform their pilgrimages on foot, their staves serving them instead of
horses or mules, then called bourdons and burdones, by writers in the Middle
Ages." Mr. Johnes's Translation of Joinville's Memoirs, Dissertation xv. by
M. du Cange, p. 152, 4to edit. The word is thrice used by Chaucer in the
Romaunt of the Rose.

326 THE VISION. 85—115.

That thou hast folio w'd ; and how far behind,

When following my discourse, its learning halts :

And mayst behold your art,1 from the divine

As distant, as the disagreement is

'Twixt earth and heaven's most high and rapturous orb."

" I not remember," I replied, " that e'er
I was estranged from thee ; nor for such fault
Doth conscience chide me." Smiling she return'd :
" If 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
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 2
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 3 both, beheld
Forth from one fountain issue ; and, like friends,
Linger at parting. " 0 enlightening beam !
0 glory of our kind ! beseech thee say

1 Mayst behold your art.] The second persons, singular and plural, are
here used intentionally by our author, the one referring to himself alone, the
second to mankind in general. Compare Hdl, xi. 107. But I will follow the
example of Brunck, who in a note on a passage in the Philoctetes of Sophocles,
v. 369, where a similar distinction requires to be made, says that it would be
ridiculous to multiply instances in a matter so well known.

2 So paused. ,] Lombardi imagines that the seven nymphs, who represent the
four cardinal and the three evangelical virtues, are made to stop at the verge
of the shade, because retirement is the friend of every virtuous quality and
spiritual gift.

3 7, Tigris and Euphrates.]

Quaque caput rapklo tollit cum Tigride magnus
Euphrates, quos non diversis fontibus edit
Persis. Lucan, Phars. lib. 3. 258.

Tigris et Euphrates uno se fonte resolvunt.

Boetius, De Consol. Philosop>h. lib. 5. Metr. 1.

la oltre ond' esce

D'un medesimo fonte Eufrate e Tigre.

Petrarca, Son. Mie Venture, etc.

116— 142. PURGATORY, Canto XXXIII. 327

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 Eunoe 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 Sta tius, 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 x with foilage new,
Pure and made apt for mounting to the stars.

1 Renew'd.] come piante novelle

Rinnovellate da novella fronds.

So new this new-borne knight to battle new did rise.

Spenser, Faery Queene, b. 1. c. xi. st. 34.
" Rinnovellate " is another of those words which Chaucer in vain endeavoured
to introduce into our language from the Italian, unless it be supposed that he
rather borrowed it from the French. " Certes ones a yere at the lest way it is
lawful to ben houseled, for sothely ones a yere all things in the earth
renovelen." The Persone's Tale.

THE VISION OF DANTE.
Parana

329

THE VISION OF DANTE.

CANTO i.

Argument.

The Poet ascends with Beatrice towards the first heaven ; and is, by her,
resolved of certain doubts which arise in his mind.

His glory, by whose might all things are moved,

Pierces the universe,1 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 conies from thence ;

For 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 2 be matter of my song.

Benign Apollo ! 3 this last labour aid ;
And make me such a vessel of thy worth,
As thy own laurel claims, of me beloved.

1 Pierces the universe.] Per l'universo penetra, etc.

his magnetic beam, that gently warms

The universe, and to each inward part

With gentle penetration, though unseen,

Shoots invisible virtue ev'n to the deep. Milton, P. L. b. 3. 586.

2 Shall noio.] Sara ora materia del mio canto.

Shall be the copious matter of my song. Ibid. b. 3. 413.

3 Benign Apollo.] Chaucer has imitated this in vocation very closely, at the
beginning of the Third Booke of Fame :

If, divine vertue, thou Thou shalt see me go as blive

Wilt helpe me to shewe now Unto the next laurer I see,

That in my head ymarked is, And kisse it, for it is thy tree.

331

Now entre thou my breast anone.

332 THE VISION. 15-40.

Thus far l hath one of steep Parnassus' brows
Sufficed me ; henceforth, there is need of both
For my remaining enterprize. Do thou 2
Enter into my bosom, and there breathe
So, as when Marsyas 3 by thy hand was dragg'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 favour'd tree
Come to the foot, and crown myself with leaves :
For to that honour thou, and my high theme
Will fit me. If but seldom, mighty Sire !
To grace his triumph, gathers thence a wreath
Caesar, or bard,4 (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 5
Great flame hath risen : after me, perchance,
Others with better voice may pray, and gain,
From the Cyrrhsean city, answer kind.

Through divers passages, the world's bright lamp
Rises to mortals ; but through that0 which joins
Four circles with the threefold cross, in best
Course, and in happiest constellation 7 set,
He comes ; and, to the worldly wax, best gives

1 Thus far.] He appears to mean nothing more than that this part of his
poem will require a greater exertion of his powers than the former.

2 Do thou.] Make me thine instrument ; and, through me, utter such sound
as when thou didst contend with Marsyas.

3 Marsyas.] Ovid, Met. lib. 6. fab. 7. Compare Boccaccio, II Filocopo,
lib. 5. p. 25, vol. ii. ediz. Fir. 1723: "Egli nel mio petto entri," etc. — "May
he enter my bosom, and let my voice sound like his own, when he made that
daring mortal deserve to come forth unsheathed from his limbs."

4 Ccesar, or bard.] So Petrarch, Son. Par. Prima:

Arbor vittoriosa trionfale,

Onor d' imperadori e di poeti.
And Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 3. cap. xiv.:

alloro,

Che imperatori e' poeti corona.
And Spenser, F. (t>. b. 1. c. i. st. 9 :

The laurel, meed of mighty conquerours

And poets sage.

5 From a small spark.]

«r«AX«v r Sen "nvo e| foes

2x{£/x.«T6? ivdoeev iti'o-tuirii vXa.v.

Upon the mountain from one spark hath leapt

The fire, that hath a mighty forest burn'd. Pindar, Pyth. iii. 67.

6 Through that] "Where the four circles, the horizon, the zodiac, the
equator, and the equinoctial colure join ; the last three intersecting each other
so as to form three crosses, as may be seen in the armillary sphere."

7 In happiest constellation.] Aries. Some understand the planet Venus by
the "miorlior stella."

41—62. PARADISE, Canto I. 333

Its temper and impression. Morning there,1
Here eve was well nigh by such passage made ;
And whiteness had o'erspread that hemisphere,
Blackness the other part ; when to the left 8
I saw Beatrice turn'd, and on the sun
Gazing, as never eagle fix'd his ken.
As from the first a second beam 3 is wont
To issue, and reflected upwards 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
Made4 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.5
And suddenly upon the day appear'd 6
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,7

1 Morning there.'] It was morning where he then was, and about eventide
on the earth.

2 To the left.'] Being in the opposite hemisphere to ours, Beatrice, that she
may behold the rising sun, turns herself to the left.

3 As from the first a second beam.] "Like a reflected sunbeam," which he
compares to a pilgrim hastening homewards.

Ne simil tanto mai raggio secondo

Dal primo usci. Filicaja, canz. xv. st. 4.

Sicut vir in peregrinatione constitutus, omni studio, omnique conatu domum
redire festinat, ac retrorsum non respicit sed ad domum, quam reliquerat,
reverti desiderat. Alberici Visio, sec. 25.

4 Made.] And therefore best adapted, says Venturi, to the good tempera-
ment and vigour of the human body and its faculties. The Poet speaks of the
terrestrial paradise where he then was.

5 As iron that comes boiling from the fire.] Ardentem, et scintillas emit-
tentem, ac si ferrum cum de fornace trahitur. Alberici Visio, sec. 5. This
simile is repeated, sec. 16. So Milton, P. L. b. 3. 594 :

As glowing iron with fire.

6 Upon the day appear'd. ]

If the heaven had y wonne

All new of God another sunne. Chaucer, First Booke of Fame.
E par ch' aggiunga un altro sole al cielo. Ariosto, 0. F. c. x. st. 109.
Ed ecco un lustro lampeggiar d' intorno
Che sole a sole aggiunse e giorno a giorno.

Marino, Adone. c. xi. st. 27.
Quando a paro col sol ma piu lucente
L'angelo gli appari sull' oriente. Tasso, O. L. c. i.

seems another morn

Ris'n on mid-noon. Milton, P. L. b. 5. 311.

Compare Euripides, Ion. 1550 : 'AvdriXio* x^ia-uxov.

1 Eternal wheels. ] The heavens, eternal, and always circling.

334 THE VISION. 63—94.

Beatrice stood unmoved ; and I with ken
Fix'd upon her, from upward gaze removed,
At her aspect, such inwardly became
As Glaucus,1 when he tasted of the herb
That made him peer among the ocean gods :
Words may not tell of that transhuman change ;
And therefore let the example serve, though weak,
For these whom grace hath better proof in store.

If2 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,3
Temper'd of thee and measured, charm'd mine ear
Then seem'd to me so much of heaven 4 to blaze
With the sun's flame, that rain or flood ne'er made
A lake so broad. The newness of the sound,
Aiid that great light, inflamed me with desire,
Keener than e'er was felt, to know their1 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

1 As Glaucus.] Ovid, Met. lib. 13. fab. 9. Plato, in the tenth book of
the Republic, makes a very noble comparison from Glaucus, but applies it
differently. Edit. Bipont, vol. vii. p. 317. Berkeley appears not to have been
aware of the passage, when he says that "Proclus compares the soul, in her
descent, invested with growing prejudices, to Glaucus diving to the bottom
of the sea, and there contracting divers coats of sea-weed, coral, and shells,
which stick close to him, and conceal his true shape." Sins, ed. 1744, p. 151.

2 If.] "Thou, 0 divine Spirit, knowest whether I had not risen above my
human nature, and were not merely such as thou hadst then formed me."

3 Harmony.] The harmony of the spheres.

And after that the melodie herd he
That cometh of thilke speris thryis three,
That welles of musike ben and melodie
In this world here, and cause of harmonic

Chaucer, The Assemble of Foules.

In their motion harmony divine

So smooths her charming tones, that God's own ear

Listens delighted. - Milton, P. L. b. 5. 627.

4 So much of heaven. ] The sphere of fire, as Lombardi well explains it.

95—125. PARADISE, Canto I. 335

From admiration deep ; but now admire
How I above those lighter bodies rise."

Whence, after utterance of a piteous sigh,
She towards me bent her eyes, with such a look,
As on her frenzied child a mother casts ;
Then thus began : " Among themselves all things
Have order ; and from hence the form,1 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.2 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 bow ; 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,3
In which the substance, that hath greatest speed,4
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 is it true,
That as, oft-times, but ill accords the form
To the design of art, through sluggishness 5

1 From hence the form.'] This order it is, that gives to the universe the
form of unity, and therefore of resemblance to God.

2 Whither the line is drawn. ] All things, as they have their beginning from
the Supreme Being, so are they referred to him again.

3 The heaven.] The empyrean, which is always motionless.

4 The substance, that hath greatest speed.] The primum mobile.

5 Through sluggishness.]

Perch' a risponder la materia e sorda.
So Filicaja, canz. vi. st. 9 :

Perche a risponder la discordia e sorda.
"The workman hath in his heart a purpose, he carrieth in mind the whole
form which his work should have ; there wanteth not in him skill and desire
to bring his labour to the best effect ; only the matter, which he hath to
work on, is unframable." Hooker's Eccl. Polity, b. 5. sec. 9. Our Poet, in
his De Monorchia, has expressed the same thought more fully: "Sciendum,"
etc., lib. 2. p. 115. " We must know, that as art is found in a triple degree,
in the mind that is of the artist, in the instrument, and in the matter formed
by art, so we may contemplate nature also in a triple degree. For nature is
in the mind of the first mover, who is God ; then in heaven, as in an instru-
ment, by means of which the similitude of the eternal goodness is unfolded
in variable matter ; and, as the artist being perfect, and the instrument in

336 THE VISION. 126-137.

Or unreplying matter ; so this course 1
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 vitious fondness. Thou no more admire
Thy soaring, (if I rightly deem,) than lapse
Of torrent downwards from a mountain's height.
There would 2 in thee for wonder be more cause,
If, free of hinderance, thou hadst stay'd below,
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 of the spots or
shadows, which appear in that body, is explained to him.

All ye, who in small bark 3 have following sail'd,
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 ;

the best order, if there is any fault in the form of art, it is to be imputed
only to the matter ; so, since God reaches to the end of perfection, and his
instrument, which is heaven, is not in any wise deficient of due perfection,
(as appears from what we know by philosophy concerning heaven) it remain-
eth that whatever fault is in inferior things, is a fault of the matter worked
on, and clean beside the intention of God and of heaven."

1 This course.] Some beings, abusing the liberty given them by God,
are repugnant to the order established by him.

2 There would.] Hence, perhaps, Milton :

in our proper motion we ascend

Up to our native seat : descent and fall

To us were adverse. P. L. b. 2. v. 77.

3 In small bark.] Con la barchetta mia cantando in rima.

Pulci, Morg. Magg. c. xxviii.
Io me n'andro con la barchetta mia,
Quanto 1'acqua comporta un picciol legno. Ibid.
Say, shall my little bark attendant sail ? Pope, Essay on Man, Ep. iv.

14—46. PARADISE, Canto 11. 337

Through the dec]) brine ye fearless may put out
Your vessel ; marking well the furrow broad
Before you in the wave, that on both rides
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,1 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 star2 we come."

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 unit,
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 3 that man at first believes.

1 The increate perpetual thirst.'] The desire of celestial beatitude, natural
to the soul.

2 This first star.] The moon.

3 E'en as the truth.] "Like a truth, that does not need demonstration, but
is self-evident." Thus Plato, at the conclusion of the Sixth Book of the
Republic, lays down four principles of information in the human mind : " 1st,
intuition of self-evident truth, vows : 2d, demonstration by reasoning,
iiiveioc, ; 3d, belief on testimony, trims ; 4th, probability, or conjecture,
i/as*(t/«." I cannot resist adding a passage to the like effect from Hooker's
Ecclesiastical Polity, b. 2. sec. 7 : "The truth is, that the mind of man desireth
evermore to know the truth, according to the most infallible certainty which
the nature of things can yield. The greatest assurance generally with all men,
is that which we have by plain aspect and intuitive beholding. Where we
cannot attain unto this, there what appeareth to be true, by strong and
invincible demonstration, such as wherein it is not by any way possible to be
deceived, thereunto the mind doth necessarily assent, neither is it in the
choice thereof to do otherwise. And in case these both do fail, then which
way greatest probability leadeth, thither the mind doth evermore incline."

Y

338 THE VISION. 47—78.

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 l in fabling quaint 1 "

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." 2

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,3 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
Of formal principles ; and these, save one,4
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.5 The first,

1 Cain.] Compare Hell, Canto xx. 123, and Note.

2 By bodies dense or rare.] Lombardi observes, that the opinion respecting
the spots in the moon, which Dante represents himself as here yielding to the
arguments of Beatrice, is professed by our author in the Convito, so that we
may conclude that work to have been composed before this portion of the
Diffina Commedia : " The shadow in the moon is nothing else but the rarity
of its body, which hinders the rays of the sun from terminating and being
reflected, as in other parts of it." P. 70.

3 Numberless lights.'] The fixed stars, which differ both in bulk and
splendour.

4 Save one.] " Except that principle of rarity and denseness which thou
hast assigned." By "formal principles," principj formali, are meant "con-
stituent or essential causes." Milton, in imitation of this passage, introduces
the angel arguing with Adam respecting the causes of the spots on the moon.
But, as a late French translator of the Paradise, M. Artaud, well remarks, his
reasoning is physical ; that of Dante partly metaphysical and partly theologic.

Whence in her visage round those spots, unpurged

Vapours not yet into her substance turn'd. Milton, P. L. b. 5. 420.

5 Change the leaves.] Woidd, like leaves of parchment, be darker in some
part than others.

71)— 119. PARADISE, CAHTO II. 339

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 colour 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 farther 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 equaling 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,

Dismantled in thy mind, I will inform

"With light so lively, that the tremulous beam

Shall quiver where it falls. Within the heaven,1

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.

1 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.
Tims Milton, P. Z. b. 3. 481 :

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.

340 THE VISION. 120-14a

Thus do these organs of the world proceed,

As thou beholdest now, from step to step ;

Their influences from above deriving,

And thence transmitting downwards. 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 1 be inspired. This heaven,2
Made beauteous by so many luminaries,
From the deep spirit,3 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 4 compact different
Makes with the precious body it enlivens,
"With which it knits, as life in you is knit.
From its original nature full of joy,
The virtue mingled 5 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 Picearda, 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.

1 By blessed movers.'] By angels.

2 This heaven.'] The heaven of fixed stars.

3 The deep sjririt.] The moving angel.

4 Different virtue?] " There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of
the moon, and another glory of the stars : for one star differeth from another star
in glory. " 1 Cor. xv. 41. The words are nearly Plato's, whom St. Paul seems
to have had in view throughout this part of his argument. Mi* i*h \lvv*ij.if\

%Kiov [x,i* Si, <rt\r,vrx '/Jt,i* Se, rain sravnwv cio-r^m x. r. A. JUpinomis, ed. Bip. vol. ix.

p. 262.

5 The virtue mingled.] Virg. jEn. lib. 6. 724 : Principio coelum, etc.

1—46. PARADISE, Canto III. 341

That sun,1 which erst with love my bosom warm
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 2 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
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 flavour, 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 witli 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 :

1 That sun.] "Beatrice.

2 Delusion, j " An error the contrary to that of Narcissus ; because he mis-
took a shadow lor a substance ; I, a substance for a shadow."

342 THE VISION. 47—92.

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,1 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."

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 sayst 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 1 "

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 nought 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 befal,
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 it 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

1 Piccarda.'] The sister of Corso Donati, and of Forese whom we have seen
in the Purgatory, Canto xxiii. Petrarch has been supposed to allude to this
lady in his Triumph of Chastity, v. 160, etc.

93—121. PARADISE, Canto III. 343

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,1 through which she had not drawn

The shuttle to its point. She thus began :

"Exalted worth and j>erfectness of life

The Lady 2 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 3 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,4 who from that loud blast,

1 What web it was.] " What vow of religious life it was that she had been
hindered from completing, had been compelled to break."

2 The Lady.] St. Clare, the foundress of the order called after her. She
was born of opulent and noble parents at Assisi, in 1193, and died in 1253.
See Biogr. Univ. t. i. p. 598, 8vo. Paris, 1813.

3 God knows.] Rodolfo da Tossignano, Hist. Seraph. Relig. P. i. p. 138, as
cited by Lombardi, relates the following legend of Piccarda : — " Her brother
Corso, inflamed with rage against his virgin sister, having joined with him
Fariuata, an infamous assassin, and twelve other abandoned ruffians, entered
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. Before 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." Perhaps, adds the
worthy Franciscan, our Poet not being able to certify himself entirely of this
occurrence, has chosen to pass it over discreetly, by making Piccarda say —

God knows how, after that, my life was framed.

4 Constance.] Daughter of Ruggieri, king of Sicily, who being taken by force
out of a monastery where she had professed, was married to the Emperor Henry
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

344 THE VISION. 122—133.

Which blew the second * over Suabia's realm,

That power produced, which was the third and last.5'

She ceased from further talk, and then began
" Ave Maria " singing ; and with that song
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 assigned to the blessed, and
respecting the will absolute or conditional. He inquires whether it is
possible to make satisfaction for a vow broken.

Between two kinds of food,2 both equally
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 3 a dog would stand.
Wherefore, if I was silent, fault nor praise

age, she was delivered in a pavilion, and it was given out that any lady, who
pleased, was at liberty to see her. Many came, and saw her ; and the suspicion
ceased." Ricordano Malaspiua, in Muratori, Her. It. Scrijjt. t. viii. p. 939 ;
and G. Villani, in the same words, Hist. lib. 5. c. xvi. The French translator
above mentioned speaks of her having poisoned her husband. The death of
Henry VI. is recorded in the Chronicon Sicilies, by an anonymous writer,
(Muratori, t. x.) but not a word of his having been poisoned by Constance ;
and Ricordano Malaspina even mentions her decease as happening before that
of her husband, Henry V., for so this author, with some others, terms him.

1 The second.] Henry VI., son of Frederick I., was the second emperor of the
house of Suabia ; and his son Frederick II. "the third and last."

2 Between two kinds of food.] "Si aliqua dico sunt penitus aequalia, non
magis movetur homo ad unum quam ad aliud ; sicut famelicus, si habet cibum
sequaliter appetibilem in diversis partibus, et secundum aequalem distantiam,
non magis movetur ad unum quam ad alteram." Thomas Aquinas, Summ.
Theolog. ima ii,lae Partis. Questio xiii. Art. vi.

3 Between two deer.] Tigris ut, auditis, di versa valle duorum,

Extimulata fame, mugitibus armentorum,
Nescit utro potius mat, et mere ardet utroque.

Ovid, Metam. lib. 5. 166.

8—36. PARADISE, Canto IV. 345

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,1 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 ; 2
So that thy anxious thought is in itself
Bound up and stifled, nor breathes freely forth.
Thou arguest : if the good intent remain ;
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 3 deem'd,
Return. These are the questions which thy will
Urge equally ; and therefore I, the first,
Of that 4 will treat which hath the more of gall.5
Of seraphim 6 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, diversely
Partaking of sweet life, as more or less
Afflation of eternal bliss pervades them.

1 Daniel.'] See Daniel, ii. Beatrice did for Dante what Daniel did for
Nebuchadnezzar, when he freed the king from the uncertainty respecting his
dream, which had enraged him against the Chaldeans. Lombardi conjectures
that " Fe si Beatrice" should be read, instead of " Fessi Beatrice ;" and his
conjecture has since been confirmed by the Monte Casino MS.

2 By each of these desires.'] His desire to have each of the doubts, which
Beatrice mentions, resolved.

3 Plato.] Sutr-itrx; it, x t. a. Plato, Timceus, vol. ix. p. 326, edit. Bip.
11 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.

6 Of Seraphim.] " He 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
beheld ; 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 Timceus 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 understanding,
they appear to have different spheres allotted to them.

7 The first circle.] The empyrean.

346 THE VISION. 37—66.

Here were they shown thee, not that fate assigns
This for their sphere, but for a sign to thee
Of that celestial farthest 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 x to God
Attributes, nor so means : and holy church
Doth represent with human countenance
Gabriel, and Michael, and him who made
Tobias whole.2 Unlike what here thou seest,
The judgment of Timseus,3 who affirms
Each soul restored to its particular star ;
Believing it to have been taken thence,
When nature gave it to inform her mold :
Yet to appearance his intention is
Not what his words declare : and so to shun
Derision, haply thus he hath disguised
His true opinion.4 If his meaning be,
That to the influencing of these orbs revert
The honour 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.

1 Hands and feet.] Thus Milton :

What surmounts the reach

Of human sense, I shall delineate so,
By likening spiritual to corporeal forms,
As shall express them best. P. L. b. 5. 575.

These passages, rightly considered, may tend to remove the scruples of some,
who are offended by any attempts at representing the Deity in pictures.

2 Him who made

Tobias whole.]

Raphael, the sociable spirit, that deign'd

To travel with Tobias, and secured

His marriage with the seven times wedded maid. Ibid. 223.

3 Timceus.] In the C'anvito, p. 92, our author again refers to the Timceus
of Plato, on the subject of the mundane system ; but it is in order to give the
preference to the opinion respecting it held by Aristotle.

4 His true ojrinion.] In like manner, our learned Stillingfleet has professed
himself "somewhat inclinable to think that Plato knew more of the lapse of
mankind than he would openly discover, and for that end disguised it after his
usual manner in that hypothesis of pre-existence." Origines Sacra?, b. 3.
cap. iii. sec. 15.

5 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

67—102. PARADISE, Canto IV. 347

" That, to the eye of man,5 our justice seems
Unjust, is argument for faith, and not
For heretic declension. But, to the end
Tli is truth 1 may stand more clearly in your view,
I will content thee even to thy wish.

" If violence be, when that which suffers, nought
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 2 firm, or wrought in Scsevola 3
To his own hand remorseless ; to the path,
Whence they were drawn, their steps had hasten'd back,
When liberty return'd : but in too few,
Resolve, so stedfast, dwells. And by these words,
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 Alcmseon,4 at his father's 5 suit
Slew his own mother ; 6 so made pitiless
Not to lose pity. On this point bethink thee,

heresy." Such appears to me the most satisfactory explanation of the
passage.

1 This truth.] That it is no impeachment of God's justice, if merit be
lessened through compulsion of others, without any failure of good intention
on 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 to them, of returning to the
monastic life.

2 Laurence.'] Who suffered martyrdom in the third century.

3 Sccevola.] See Liv. Hist. D. i. lib. 2. 12.

4 AlciTiceon.] Ovid, Met. lib. 9. f. 10:

Ultusque parente parentem

Natus, erit facto pius et sceleratus eodem.

5 His father's,] Amphiariius.

6 His own mother.] Eriphyle.

343 THE VISION. 103—137.

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 x
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.

" 0 thou, of primal love the prime delight,
Goddess ! " I straight replied, "whose lively words
Still shed new heat and vigour 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 2 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
The wild beast, soon as she hath reach'd that bourn:.
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.

^Irxjttttunt.

The question proposed in the last Canto is answered. Dante ascends with
Beatrice to the planet Mercury, which is the second heaven ; and here he

1 Of will.] " What Piccarda asserts of Constance, that she retained her
affection to the monastic life, is said absolutely and without relation to circum-
stances ; and that, which I affirm, is spoken of the will conditionally and
respectively : so that our apparent difference is without anv disagreement."

2 That truth.] The light of divine truth.

1—31. PARADISE, Canto V. 349

finds a multitude of spirits, one of whom offers to satisfy him of any thing
he may desire to know from them.

" If beyond earthly wont,1 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
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,2 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, wheiewith
All intellectual creatures, and them sole,
He hath endow'd. Hence now thou mayst infer
Of what liigli 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 tliou hast oblation made,
By using well thou think'st to consecrate,

1 If beyond earthly want.] Dante having been unable to sustain the
splendour of Beatrice, as we have seen at the end of the last Canto, she tells
him to attribute her increase of brightness to the place in which they were.

2 Supreme of gifts.] So in the Be Monorchia, lib. 1. p. 107 and 108 : " Si
ergo judicium moveat," etc. "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 preventing 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 appear manifest, that intellectual substances,
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 account of
the immutability of the will, but retain it most perfectly and powerfully.
This being discerned, it is again plain, that this liberty, or principle of all our
liberty, is the greatest good conferred on human nature by God ; because by
this very thing we are here made happy, as men ; by this we are elsewhere
happy, as divine beings."

350 THE VISION. 32—72.

Thou wouldst of theft x 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
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,3
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,4 the yellow and the white.
Nor deem of any change, as less than vain,
If the last bond 5 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,' than 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

1 Thou wouldst of theft.'] " Licet fin- <le furto," etc. De Monarchid, lib. 2.
p. 123. "Although a thief should out of that which he has stolen give help
to a poor man, yet is that not to be called almsgiving."

2 Two things.] The one, the substance of the vow, as of a single life for
instance, or of keeping fast ; the other, the compact, or form of it.

3 It was enjoin'd the Israelites.] See Lev. c. xii. and xxvii.

4 Either key.] Purgatory, Canto ix. 108.

5 If the hist bond.] If the thing substituted be not far more precious than
that which is released.

73—114. PARADISE, Canto V. 351

Of so fell sacrifice. Be ye more staid,
0 Christians ! not, like feather, by each wind
Removeable ; 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 ;
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,1 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
Towards it, deeming it their food ; so drew
Full more than thousand splendours towards 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. " 0 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

1 That region.'] As some explain it, the east : according to others, the
equinoctial line. Lombardi supposes it to mean that she looked upwards.
Monti, in Ins Proposta (vol. iii. pte ii. p. Ixxix. Milan, 1826), has adduced a
passage from our author's Conmto, which fixes the sense : Dico ancora, che
quanto il Cielo e piu presso al cerchio equatore, tanto e piu mobile per com-
parazione alii suoi ; perocche ha piu movimento, e piu attualita, e piu vita, e
piii forma, e piii tocca di quello, che e sopra se, e per conseguente piu virtuoso.
P. 48.

352 THE VISION. 115—134.

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 harbour'st, and from thence the virtue bring'st,
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 1 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 2
Hath on the mantle of thick vapours prey'd ;
Within its proper ray the saintly shape
Was, through increase of gladness, thus conceal'd ;
And, shrouded so in splendour, answer'd me,
E'en as the tenour of my song declares.

CANTO VI.

Jtrgumcttt.
The spirit, who had offered to satisfy the inquiries of Dante, declares himself
to he the Emperor Justinian ; 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.

" After that Constantine the eagle turn'd 3
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,4 his seat
At Europe's extreme point,5 the bird of Jove

1 This spliere.] The planet Mercury, which, being nearest to the sun, is
cftenest hidden by that luminary.

2 When his warm gaze.] When the sun has dried up the vapours, that
shaded his brightness.

3 After that Constantine the eagle turn'd.] Constantine, in transferring the
seat of empire from Rome to Byzantium, carried the eagle, the Imperial
ensign, from the west to the east. ^Eneas, on the contrary, had, with better
augury, moved along with the sun's course, when he passed from Troy to Italy.

4 A hundred years twice told and more.] The Emperor Constantine entered
Byzantium in 324 ; and Justinian began his reign in 527.

5 At Europe's extreme point.] Constantinople being situated at the extreme
of Europe, and on the borders of Asia, near those mountains in the neighbour-
hood of Troy, from whence the first founders of Rome had emigrated.

7—36. PARADISE, Canto VI. 353

Held, near the mountains, whence he issued first ;

There under shadow of his sacred plumes

Swaying the world, till through successive hands

To mine lie came devolved. Cesar 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.1

Or e'er that work engaged me, I did hold

In Christ one nature only ; 2 with such faith

Contented. But the blessed Agapete,3

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 conj ointment, '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 4 and who oppose.5

" Beginning from that hour, when Pallas died G
To give it rule, behold the valorous deeds
Have made it worthy reverence. Not unknown 7

1 To clear the incumber'd laws.] The code of laws was abridged and re-
formed by Justinian.

Giustiniano son io, disse il primajo,

Che 1 troppo e '1 van secai for delle leggi,
Ora soggette all' arme e al denajo.

Frezzi, II Quadriregio, lib. 4. cap. xiii.

2 In Christ one nature only.'] Justinian is said to have been a follower of
the heretical opinions held by Eutyches, "who taught that in Christ there
was but one nature, viz. that of the incarnate word." Maclaine's Mosheim,
torn. ii. cent. v. p. ii. cap. v. sec. 13.

3 Agapete.] " Agapetus, Bishop of Rome, whose Scheda Regia, addressed
to the Emperor Justinian, procured him a place among the wisest and most
judicious writers of this century." Ibid. cent. vi. p. ii. cap. ii. sec. 8. Com-
pare Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xvi.

4 Who pretend its power.]" The Ghibellines.
6 And icho oppose.] The Guelphs.

6 Pallas died. See Virgil, jEn. lib. 10.

7 Not unknown.] In the second book of his treatise De Monarchic, where
Dante endeavours to prove that the Roman people had a right to govern the
world, he refers to their conquests and successes in nearly the same order as
in this passage. " The Roman," he affirms, "might truly say, as the Apostle
did to Timothy, There is laid up for me a crown of righteousness ; laid up,

Z

354 THE VISION. 37—56.

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 ; 1
Nor aught unknown to thee, which it achieved
Down 2 from the Sabines' wrong to Lucrece' woe ;
"With its seven kings conquering the nations round;
Nor all it wrought, by Eoman worthies borne
'Gainst Brennus and the Epirot prince,3 and hosts
Of single chiefs, or states in league combined
Of social warfare : hence, Torquatus stern,
And Quintius 4 named of his neglected locks,
The Decii, and the Fabii hence acquired
Their fame, which I with duteous zeal embalm.5
By it the pride of Arab hordes 6 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 7
Under whose summit 8 thou didst see the light,
Kued its stern bearing. After, near the hour, 9

that is, in the eternal providence of God." P. 131. And again : " Now it is
manifest, that by duel (per duellum) the Roman people acquired the Empire ;
therefore they acquired it by right, to prove which is the main purpose of the
present book." P. 132.

1 The rival three.'] The Horatii and Curiatii.

2 Down.'] "From the rape of the Sabine women to the violation of
Lucretia, "

3 The Epirot prince. King Pyrrhus.

4 Quintius.] Quintius Cincinnatus.

E Cincinnato dall' inculta chioma. Petrarca.

Compare Be Monarchic, lib. 2. p. 121, etc.: "Itaque, inquit, et majores
nostri," etc.

5 Embalm.] The word in the original is "mirro," which some think is put
for " miro," "I behold or regard;" and others understand, as I have
rendered it.

6 Arab hordes.] The Arabians seem to be put for the barbarians in general.
Lombardi's comment is, that as the Arabs are an Asiatic people, and it is not
recorded that Hannibal had any other troops except his own countrymen the
Carthaginians, who were Africans, we must understand that Dante denomin-
ates that people, Arabs, on account of their origin. " Ab Ifrico Arabia? Felicis
rege, qui omnium primus banc terram ( Africam) incoluisse fertur," etc. Leo
Africanus, Africa? Descriptio, lib. 1. cap. i.

7 That hill.] The city of Fesulae, which was sacked by the Romans after
the defeat of Catiline.

8 Under vohose summit.'] "At the foot of which is situated Florence, thy
birth-place."

9 Near the hour.] Near the time of our Saviour's birth. " The immeasur-
able goodness of the Deity being willing again to conform to itself the human
creature, which by transgression of the first man had from God departed,
and fallen from his likeness, it was determined in that most high and closest
consistory of the Godhead, the Trinity, that the Son of God should descend
upon earth to make this agreement. And because it was behoveful, that at
his coming, the world, not only the heaven but the earth, should be in the
bast possible disposition ; and the best disposition of the earth is, when it is

57—90. PARADISE, Canto VI. 355

When heaven was minded that o'er all the world

His own deep calm should brood, to Caesar's hand

Did Rome consign it ; and what then it wrought 1

From Var unto the Rhine, saw Isere's Hood,

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. Towards 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,2
It wrought, is now by Cassius and Brutus
Bark'd of 3 in hell ; and by Perugia's sons,
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 Caesar 4 look ; for to his hands,
The living Justice, in whose breath I move,

a monarchy, that is, all under one prince, as hath been said above ; therefore
through the divine forecast was ordained that people and that city for the
accomplishment, namely, the glorious Rome." Convito, p. 138. The same
argument is repeated at the conclusion of the first book of our author's
treatise De Monarchic.

1 What then it wrought.] In the following fifteen lines the Poet has comprised
the exploits of Julius Caesar, for which, and for the almsions in the greater part
of this speech of Justinian's, I must refer my reader to the history of Rome.

2 In its next bearer's gripe.] With Augustus Caesar.

3 Bark'd of.] rototZP £***«?. Sophocles, Electra, 299.

4 The third Ccesar.] The eagle in the hand of Tiberius, the third of the
Caesars, outdid all its achievements, both past and future, by becoming the
instrument of that mighty and mysterious act of satisfaction made to the divine
justice in the crucifixion of our Lord. This is Lombardi's explanation ; and
he deserves much credit for being right, where all the other commentators,
as far as I know, are wrong. See Note to Purg. Canto xxxii. 50.

356 THE VISION. 91—107.

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 x 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 2
Sped to her rescue. Judge then for thyself
Of those, whom I ere while accused to thee,
What they are, and how grievous their offending,
Who are the cause of all your ills. The one 3
Against the universal ensign rears
The yellow lilies ; 4 and with partial aim,
That, to himself, the other5 arrogates :
So that 'tis hard to see who most offends.
Be yours, ye Ghibellines,6 to veil your hearts

1 Vengeance for vengeance."] This will be afterwards explained by the Poet
himself. See next Canto, v. 47, and Note.

2 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
represented, both in this instance and in what follows, as conscious of the
events that had taken place after his own time.

3 The one.] The Guelp'h party.

4 The yellow lilies.] The French ensign.

5 The other.] The Ghibelline party.

6 Ye Ghibellines.] "Authors ditfer much as to the beginning of these
factions, and the origin of the names by which they were distinguished. Some
say that they began in Italy as early as the time of the Emperor Frederick I.
in his well-known disputes with Pope Alexander III. about the year 1160.
Others make them more ancient, dating them from the reign of the Emperor
Henry IV., who died in 1125. But the most common opinion is, that they
arose in the contests between the Emperor Frederick II. and Pope Gregory IX.,
and that this Emperor, wishing to ascertain who were his own adherents, and
who those of the Pope, caused the former to be marked by the appellation of
Ghibellines, and the latter by that of Guelphs. It is more probable, however,
that the factions were at this time either renewed, or diffused more widely,
and that their origin was of an earlier date, since it is certain that G. Villain,
b. 5. cap. xxxvii., Rieordano Malaspina, cap. civ., and Pietro Buoninsegni, b. 1.,
of their histories of Florence, are agreed, that even from 1215, that is, long before
Frederick had succeeded to the Empire, and Gregory to the Pontificate, by the
death of Buondelmonte Buondebnonti, one of the chief gentlemen in Florence,
(see Par. Canto xvi. v. 139.) the factions of the Guelfi and Ghibellini were
introduced into that city." A. G. Artegiani, Annotations on the Qnadriregio,
p. 180. "The same variety of opinion prevails with regard to the origin of
the names. Some deduce them from two brothers, who were Germans, the
one called Guelph and the other Gibel, who being the partizans of two power-
ful families in Pistoia, the Panciatichi, and the Cancellieri, then at enmity
with each other, were the first occasion of these titles having been given to the
discordant factions. Others, with more probability, derive them from Guelph
or Guelfone, Duke of Bavaria, and Gibello, a castle where his antagonist, the
Emperor Conrad the Third, was born ; in consequence of a battle between
Guelph and Henry the son of Conrad, which was fought (according to Mini, in
his Defence of Florence, p. 48) A.D. 1138. Others assign to them an origin

108—131. PARADISE, Canto VI. 357

Beneath another standard : ill is this

Folio w'd of him, who severs it and justice :

And let not with his Guelphs the new-crown'd Charles1

Assail it ; but those talons hold in dread,

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 armour for his lilied shield.

"This little star is furnish'd with good spirits,
Whose mortal lives were busied to that end,
That honour and renown might wait on them :
And, when desires 2 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 j ustice
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,3 whose goodly deed and fair

yet more ancient ; asserting, that at the election of Frederick I. to the Empire,
the Electors concurred in chusing him, in order to extinguish the inveterate
discords between the Guelphs and Ghibellines, that prince being descended by
the paternal line from the Ghibellines, and by the maternal from the Guelphs.
Bartolo, however, in his tractate De Guelphis et Gibellinis gives an intrinsic
meaning to these names from certain passages in Scripture : ' Sicut Gibellus
interpretatur locus fortitudinis, ita Gibellini appellantur confidentes in
fortitudine militum et armorum, et sicut Guelpha interpretatur os loquens, ita
Guelphi interpretantur confidentes in orationibus et in divinis.' What value
is to be put on this interpretation, which well accords with the genius of those
times, when it was perhaps esteemed a marvellous mystery, we leave it to
others to decide." Ibid.

1 Charles.'] The commentators explain this to mean Charles II. king of
Naples 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
Boniface, with the promise of being made emperor? See G. Villani, lib. 8.
cap. xlii.

2 When desires.'] When honour and fame are the chief motives to action,
that love, which has heaven for its object, must necessarily become less
fervent.

3 Homed slight.] The story of Romeo is involved in some uncertainty. The
name of Romeo signified, as we have seen in the Note, Purg. Canto xxxiii. v.
78, one who went on a pilgrimage to Rome. The French writers assert the
continuance of his ministerial office even after the decease of his sovereign,
Raymond Berenger, Count of Provence : and they rest this assertion chiefly on
the fact of a certain Romieu de Villeneuve, who was the contemporary of that
prince, having left large possessions behind him, as appears by his will pre-
served in the archives of the bishoprick of Vence. That they are right as to
the name at least, would appear from the following marginal note on the

358 THE VISION. 132-144.

Met ill acceptance. But the Provencals,

That were his foes, have little cause for mirth.

Ill shapes that man his course, who makes his wrong

Of other's worth. Four daughters x were there born

To Raymond Berenger ; 2 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

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.

In consequence of what had been said by Justinian, who together with the
other spirits have now disappeared, some doubts arise in the mind of
Dante respecting the human redemption. These difficulties are fully
explained by Beatrice.

" Hosanna 3 Sanctus Deus Sabaoth,
Superillustrans claritate tu&
Felices ignes horum malahoth."

Monte Casino MS. : Romeo de Villanova districtus civitatis Ventiae de
Proviucia olim administratoris Raymundi Belingerj Comitis de Provincia — ivit
peregriuando contemplatione ad Deum. Yet it is improbable, on the other hand,
that the Italiaus, who lived so near the time, should be misinformed in an
occurrence of such notoriety. According to them, after he had long been a
faithful steward to Raymond, when an account was required from him of the
revenues which he had carefully husbanded, and his master as lavishly
disbursed, " he demanded the little mule, the staff, and the scrip, with which
he had first entered into the count's service, 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." G. Villani, lib. 6. cap. xcii. The same incidents
are told of him at the conclusion of cap. xxviii. lib. 2. of Fazio degli Uberti's
Dittamondo.

1 Four daughters.] Of the four daughters of Raymond Berenger, Margaret,
the eldest, was married to Louis IX. 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.

2 Raymond Berenger.'] This prince, the last of the house of Barcelona, who
was Count of Provence, died in 1245. He is in the list of Provencal poets.
See Millot, Hist. Litt. des Troubadours, torn. ii. p. 212. But M. Raynouard
could find no manuscript of his works. See Choix des Poesies des Troubadours,
torn. v. p. vii.

3 Hosanna.] "Hosanna holy God of Sabaoth, abundantly illumining with
thy brightness the blessed fires of these kingdoms."

4—44. PARADISE, Canto VII. 359

Thus chanting saw I turn that substance bright,1
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,2
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,3 condemn'd himself ;
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 it 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 4 flow'd from one act :

1 That substance bright.'] Justinian.

2 As might have made one blest amid the flames.] So Giusto de' Conti, Bella
Mano, " Qual salamandra : "

Che puommi nelle fiamme far beato.

3 That man, who teas unborn.] Adam.

4 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 malignity :
and while heaven opened for joy at the ransom of man, the earth trembled
through compassion for its Maker.

360 THE VISION. 45—79.

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 l 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 sayst : 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. The celestial love,2 that spurns
All envying in its bounty, in itself
With such effulgence blazeth, as sends forth
All beauteous things eternal. What distils 3
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 4 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,

1 A just vengeance.] The punishment of Christ by the Jews, although just
as far as regarded the human nature assumed by him, and so a righteous
vengeance of sin, yet being unjust as it regarded the divine nature, was itself
justly revenged on the Jews by the destruction of Jerusalem.

2 The celestial love. From Boetius, Be Consol. Philos. lib. 3. Metr. 9 :

Quem non externae pepulerunt fingere causae
Materiae fluitantis opus, verum insita summi
Forma boni livore carens ; tu cuncta superno
Ducis ab exemplo, pulchrum pulcherrimus ipse
Mundum mente gerens, similique in imagine formans,
Perfectasque jubens perfectum absolvere partes.

3 What distils.] " That, which proceeds immediately from God, and without
the intervention of secondary causes, is immortal."

4 These tokens of pre-eminence. ] The before-mentioned gifts of immediate
creation by God, independence on secondary causes, and consequent similitude
and agreeableness to the divine Being, all at first conferred on man.

80—120. PARADISE, Canto VII. 3G1

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
.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.1
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,
Either 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 2 unfold my speech,
That thou mayst see it clearly as myself.

1 By both his ways, I mean, or one alone.] Either by mercy and justice
united, or by mercy alone.

2 In some part.] She reverts to that part of her discourse where she had
said that what proceeds immediately 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, received their form not immediately from
God, but from a virtue or power created by God ; that the soul of brutes and
plants is in like manner drawn forth by the stars with a combination of those

362 THE VISION. 121—144.

" I 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, impassible 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,
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 x from complexion with meet power endued.
But this our life the eternal good inspires
Immediate, and enamours of itself ;
So that our wishes rest for ever here.

" And hence thou mayst by inference conclude
Our resurrection certain,2 if thy mind
Consider how the human flesh was framed,
When both our parents at the first were made."

elements meetly tempered, u di complession 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.

1 Draw.] I had before rendered this differently, and I now think er-
roneously :

With complex potency attract and turn.

2 Our resurrection certain.] Venturi appears to mistake the Poet's reason-
ing, when he observes: "Wretched for us, if we bad not arguments more
convincing, and of a higher kind, to assure us of the truth of our resurrection."
It is, perhaps, here intended that the whole of God's dispensation should be
taken into the account. The conclusion may be, that as before sin man was im-
mortal, and even in flesh proceeded immediately from God, so being restored
to the favour of heaven by the expiation made for sin, he necessarily recovers
his claim to immortality even in the body. There is much in this poem to
justify the encomium which the learned Salvini has passed on it, when, in an
epistle to Redi, imitating what Horace had said of Homer, that the duties of
life might be better learnt from the Grecian bard, than from the teachers of
the porch or the academy, he says —

And dost thou ask, what themes my mind engage ?
The lonely hours I give to Dante's page ;
And meet more sacred learning in his lines,
Than I had gain'd from all the school divines.

Se volete saper la vita mia,
Studiando io sto lungi da tutti gli uornini ;
Ed ho imparato piu teologia

In questi giorni, che ho riletto Dante,
Che nelle scuole fatto io non avria.

1—23. PARADISE, Canto VIII. 363

CANTO VIII.

^rgnment.
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 dis-
position from their parents.

The world l 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,2 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 honours 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 : 3 and from her,
"Whom I have sung preluding, borrow'd they
The appellation of that star, which views
Now obvious,4 and now averse, the sun.
I was not ware that I was wafted up
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 tenour keeps,
The other comes and goes ; so in that light
I other luminaries saw, that coursed
In circling motion, rapid more or less,

1 The world.'] The Poet, on his arrival at the third heaven, tells us that
the world, in its days of heathen darkness, believed the influence of sensual
love to proceed from the star, to which, under the name of Venus, they paid
divine honours ; as they worshipped the supposed mother and son of Venus,
under the names of Dione and Cupid.

2 Epicycle.] the sphere

With centric and eccentric scribbled o'er,

Cycle and epicycle. Milton, P. L. b. 8. 84.

" In sul dosso di questo cerchio," etc. Convito di Dante, p. 48. " Upon

the back of this circle, in the heaven of Venus, whereof we are now treating,

is a little sphere, which has in that heaven a revolution of its own ; whose

circle the astronomers term epicycle."

3 To sit in Dido's bosom.] Virgil, jEn. lib. 1. 718.

4 Now obvious.] Being at one part of the year, a morning, and at another
an evening star. So Frezzi :

II raggio della stella

Che'l sol vagheggia or drieto or davanti. II Qvadrir. lib. 1. cap. i.

whose ray,

Being page and usher to the day,

Does mourn behind the sun, before him play. John Hall.

£64 THE VISION. 24—57.

As their 1 eternal vision each impels.

Never was blast from vapour charged with cold,
"Whether invisible to eye or no,2
Descended with such speed, it had not seem'd
To linger in dull tardiness, compared
To those celestial lights, that towards 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 3

* Moves the third heaven : ' and in one orb we roll,
One motion, one impulse, with those who rule
Princedoms in heaven ; 4 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 splendour, through augmented joy ;
And thus it answer'd : " A short date, below,
The world possess'd me. Had the time been more,5
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,0

1 As their.] As each, according to their several deserts, partakes more or
less of the beatific vision.

2 Whether invisible to eye or no.] He calls the blast invisible, if unattended
by gross vapour ; otherwise, visible.

3 Oye! whose intellectual ministry.]

Voi ch' intendendo il terzo ciel movete.
The first line in our Poet's first Canzone. See his Convito, p. 40.

4 Princedoms in heaven.] See Canto xxviii. 112, where the princedoms are,
as here, made co-ordinate with this third sphere. In his Convito, p. 54, he has
ranked them differently, making the thrones the moving intelligences of Venus.

5 Had the time been more.] The spirit now speaking is Charles Martel,
crowned king of Hungary, and son of Charles II. king of Naples and Sicily,
to which dominions, dying in his father's lifetime, he did not succeed. The
evil, that would have been prevented by the longer life of Charles Martel, was
that resistance which his brother Eobert, king of Sicily, who succeeded him,
made to the Emperor Henry VII. See G. Villani, lib. 9. cap. xxxviii.

6 Thou lovedst me loell.] Charles Martel might have been known to our
Poet at Florence, whither he came to meet his father in 1295, the year cf his

58—78. PARADISE, Canto VIII. 365

And hadst good cause ; for Lad my sojourning

Been longer on the earth, the love I hare thee

Had put forth more than blossoms. The left bank,1

That Rhone, when he hath mix'd with Sorga, laves,

In me its lord expected, and that horn

Of fair Ausonia,2 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 3

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 4 lies in gloom,

(Not through Typhosus,5 but the vapoury cloud

Bituminous upsteam'd,) that too did look

Too have its sceptre wielded by a race

Of monarchs, sprung through me from Charles and Rodolph ; 6

Had not ill-lording,7 which doth desperate make 8

death. The retinue and the habiliments of the young monarch are minutely
described 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 honour was done him by the Florentines, and he showed
no less love towards them, and he was much in favour with all." Lib. 8.
cap. xiii. His brother Robert, king of Naples, was the friend of Petrarch.

1 The left bank.] Provence.

2 That horn

Of fair Ausonia.] The kingdom of Naples.

3 The land.] Hungary.

4 The beautiful Trinacria.] Sicily ; so called from its three promontories,
of which Pachynus and Pelorus, here mentioned, are two.

5 Typhosus.] The giant whom Jupiter is fabled to have overwhelmed under
the mountain ^Etna, from whence he vomited forth smoke and flame.

6 Sprung through mefrom Charles and Rodolph.] " Sicily would be still ruled
by a race of monarchs, descended through me from Charles I. and Rodolph 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.

7 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 III. of Arragon, in 1282.

Miracol parve ad ogni persona

Che ad una voce tutta la Cicilia

Si rubello dall' una all' altra nona,
Gridando, mora mora la famiglia

Di Carlo, mora mora gli franceschi,

E cosi ne taglio ben otto miglia.
0 quanto i forestier che giungon freschi

Nell' altrui terre, denno esser cortesi,

Fuggir lussuria e non esser maneschi.

Fazio degli Uberti, Bittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xxxix.
c Desperate make.] "Accuora." Monti in his Proposta construes this

366 THE VISION. 79—107.

The people ever, in Palermo raised

The shout of ' death,' re-echoed loud and long.

Had but my brother's foresight 1 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,2 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,3 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

"afflicts." Vellutello's interpretation of it, which is "makes desperate,"
appears to be nearer the mark.

1 My brother s foresight.] He seems to tax his brother Robert with employing
necessitous and greedy Catalonians to administer the affairs of his kingdom.

2 How bitter can spring up.] "How a covetous son can spring from a
liberal father." Yet that father has himself been accused of avarice in the
Purgatory, Canto xx. 78 ; though his general character was that of a bounteous
prince.

3 The Good.] The Supreme Being uses these spheres as the intelligent
instruments of his providence in the conduct 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 replies, that nature, he is satis-
fied, thus directed must do her part. Charles Martel then reminds him, that
he had learned from Aristotle, that human society requires a variety of con-
ditions, and consequently a variety of qualifications in its members. Ac-
cordingly, men, he concludes, are horn with different powers and capacities,
caused by the influence of the heavenly bodies at the time of their nativity ;
on which influence, and not on their parents, those powers and capacities
depend. Having thus resolved the question proposed, Charles Martel adds,
by way of corollary, 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.

108—136. PARADISE, Canto VIII. 367

That which preserves them too ; for nought, 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 th' 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 : " It 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," answer'd I ; " nor here a reason needs."

" And may that be, if different estates
Grow not of different duties in your life ?
Consult your teacher,1 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.2 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 befals
That Esau is so wide of Jacob : 3 hence

1 Consult your teacher.] Aristotle, ivu If uvouotuv v *o\ts, x. r. A..
De Hep. lib. 3. cap. iv. ' ' Since a state is made up of members differing
from one another ; (for even as an animal, 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
necessarily follows, that the excellence of all the members of the state can-
not be one and the same."

2 Whose airy voyage

Cost him his son.'] Daedalus.

3 Esau is so wide of Jacob.] Genesis, xxv. 22. Venturi blames our Poet
for selecting an instance, which, as that commentator says, proves the direct
contrary of that which he intended, as they were born under the same as-
cendant ; and, therefore, if the stars had any influence, the two brothers
should have been born with the same temperament and disposition. This
objection is well answered by Lombardi, who quotes a passage from Roger
Bacon, to show that the smallest diversity of place was held to make a di-
versity in the influence of the heavenly bodies, so as to occasion an entire
discrepancy even between children in the same womb. It must be recol-
lected, that whatever power may be attributed to the stars by our Poet, he
does not suppose it to put any constraint on the freedom of the human will ;
so that chimerical as his opinion appears to us, it was, in a moral point of
view at least, harmless.

368 THE VISION. 137—154.

Quirinus 1 of so base a father springs,

He dates from Mars liis lineage. Were it not

That Providence celestial overruled,

Nature, in generation, must the path

Traced by the generator still pursue

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,

It 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 2 your steps have wander'd from the path."

CANTO IX.

^U'Qummt.

The next spirit, who converses with our Poet in the planet Venus, is the
amorous Cunizza. To her succeeds Folco, or Folques, the Provencal
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.

After solution of my doubt, thy Charles,
O fair Clemenza,3 of the treachery 4 spake,
That must befal 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.

1 Quirinus.] Romulus, born of so obscure a father, that his parentage was
attributed to Mars.

2 Therefore.] "The wisdom of God hath divided the genius of men ac-
cording to the different affairs of the world ; and varied their inclinations
according to the variety of actions to be performed therein. Which they who
consider not, rudely rushing upon professions and ways of life unequal to
their natures, dishonour not only themselves and their functions, but pervert
the harmony of the whole world." Brown on Vulgar Errors, b. 1. ch. v.

3 0 fair Clemenza.'} Daughter of Charles Martel, and second wife of
Louis X. of France.

4 The treachery.'] He alludes to the occupation of the kingdom of Sicily by
Robert, in exclusion of his brother's son Carobert, or Charles Robert, the
rightful heir. See G. Villani, lib. 8. cap. cxii.

7—34. PAKADISE, Canto IX. 3G9

And now the visage of that saintly light 1
Was to the sun, that fills it, turn'd again,
As to the good, whose plenitude of bliss
Sufficeth all. 0 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
The will it had to pleasure me. The eyes
Of Beatrice, resting, as before,
Firmly upon me, manifested forth
Approval of my wish. " And 0," I cried,
" Blest spirit ! quickly be my will perform'd ;
And prove thou to me,2 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 3
Of the depraved Italian land, which lies
Between Eialto 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 sprang ; my name on earth Cunizza : 4
And here I glitter, for that by its light
This star o'ercame me. Yet I nought repine,5

1 That saintly light, ,] Charles Martel.

2 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.

3 In that part.] Between Rialto in the Venetian territory, and the sources
of the rivers Brenta and Piava, is situated 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.

4 Cunizza.] The adventures of Cunizza, overcome by the influence of her
star, are related by the chronicler Rolandino of Padua, lib. 1. cap. iii. in
Muratori, Rer. It. Script, torn. viii. p. 173. She eloped from her first hus-
band, Richard of St. Boniface, in the company of Sordello, (see Purg.
Canto vi. and vii.) with whom she is supposed to have cohabited before her
marriage : then lived with a soldier of Trevigi, whose wife was living 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.

5 Yet I nought repine.] ".I am not dissatisfied that I am not allotted a
higher place."

2A

370 • THE VISION. 35—53.

Nor grudge myself the cause of this my lot :
Which 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 2 absolve their round. Consider thou,
If to excel be worthy man's endeavour,
When such life may attend the first.3 Yet they
Care not for this, the crowd 4 that now are girt
By Adice and Tagliamento, still
Impenitent, though scourged. The hour is near 5
When for their stubbornness, at Padua's marsh
The water shall be changed, that laves Vicenza.
And where Cagnano meets with Sile, one 6
Lords it, and bears his head aloft, for whom
The web 7 is now a- warping. Feltro 8 too
Shall sorrow for its godless shepherd's fault,
Of so deep stain, that never, for the like,
Was Malta's 9 bar unclosed. Too large should be

1 This.] Folco of Genoa, a celebrated Provencal poet, commonly termed
Folques of Marseilles, of which place he was perhaps bishop. Many errors
of Nostradamus, concerning him, which have been followed by Crescimbeni,
Quadrio, and Millot, are detected by the diligence of Tiraboschi. Mr. Mathias's
edit. vol. i. p. 18. All that appears certain, is what we are told in this Canto,
that he was of Genoa ; and by Petrarch, in the Triumph of Love, c. iv., that he
was better known by the appellation he derived from Marseilles, and at last
assumed the religious habit. One of his verses is cited by Dante, De Vulg.
Eloq. lib. 3. cap. vi.

2 Five times.] The five hundred years are elapsed : and unless the Provencal
MSS. should be brought to light, the poetical reputation of Folco must rest on
the mention made of him by the more fortunate Italians. What I scarcely
ventured to hope at the time this note was written, has been accomplished by
the great learning and diligence of M. Raynouard. See his Choix des Poesies
des Troubadours and Lexique Roman, in which Folques and his Provencal
brethren are awakened into the second life augured to them by our Poet.

3 When such life may attend the first.] When the mortal life of man may
be attended by so lasting and glorious a memory, which is a kind of second
life.

4 The crowd.] The people who inhabited the tract of country bounded by
he rivers Tagliamento to the east and Adice to the west.

5 The hour is near.] Cunizza foretels the defeat of Giacopo da Carrara and
the Paduans, by Can Grande, at Vicenza, on the 18th September, 1314. See
G. Villani, lib. 9. cap. lxii.

6 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.

7 The web.] The net, or snare, into which he is destined to fall.

8 Feltro.] The Bishop of Feltro having received a number of fugitives from
Ferrara, who were in opposition to the Pope, under a promise of protection,
afterwards gave them up ; so that they were reconducted to that city, and the
greater part of them there put to death.

9 Malta'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 Bol-

54—76. PARADISE, Canto IX. 371

The skillet 1 that would hold Ferrara's blood,
And wearied he, who ounce by ounce would weigh it,
The which this priest,2 in show of party-zeal,
Courteous will give ; nor will the gift ill suit
The country's custom. We descry s 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 4 meanwhile wax'd
A thing to marvel at,5 in splendour glowing,
Like choicest ruby 6 stricken by the sun.
For, in that upper clime, effulgence 7 comes
Of gladness, as here laughter : and below,
As the mind saddens, murkier grows the shade.

" God seeth all : and in him is thy sight,''
Said I, "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 ardours sing,
That cowl them with six shadowing wings 8 outspread ]

sena, in which the Pope was accustomed to imprison such as had been guilty
of an irremissible sin.

1 The skillet.] The blood shed could not be contained in such a vessel, if it
were of the usual size.

2 This pi'iest.] The bishop, who, to show himself a zealous partizan of the
Pope, had committed the above-mentioned act of treachery. The commentators
are not agreed as to the name of this faithless prelate. Troy a calls him Ales-
sandro Novello, and relates the circumstances at full. Veltro Allegorico, p.
139.

3 We descry."] "We behold the things that we predict, in the mirrors of
eternal truth."

4 That other joyance.] Folco.

5 A thing to marvel at] Preclara cosa. A Latinism according to Venturi ;
but the word "preclara" had been already naturalised by Guido Guinicelli :

Oro ed argento e ricche gioje preclare.

See the sonnet, of which a version has been given in a Note to Purg. Canto xi.
v. 96.

6 Choicest ruby.] Balascio.

No saphire in Tnde no rube rich of grace

There lacked then, nor emeraude so green,

Bales. Chaucer, The Court of Love.

Mr. Tyrwhitt, I should suppose erroneously as to the sense at least intended
by Chaucer, calls it " a sort of bastard ruby."

7 Effulgence.] As joy is expressed by laughter on earth, so is it by an in-
crease of splendour in Paradise ; and, on the contrary, grief is betokened in
Hell by augmented darkness.

8 Six shadowing icings.] " Above it stood the seraphims : each one had six
wings." Isaiah, vi. 2. Ante majestatis ejus gloriam cherubim senas habentes

372 THE VISION. 77—99.

I would not wait thy asking, wert thou known
To me, as throughly I to thee am known."

He, forthwith answering, thus his words began :
" The valley of waters,1 widest next to that 2
Which doth the earth engarland, shapes its course,
Between discordant shores,3 against the sun
Inward so far, it makes meridian 4 there,
Where was before the horizon. Of that vale
Dwelt I upon the shore, 'twixt Ebro's stream
And Macra's,5 that divides with passage brief
Genoan bounds from Tuscan. East and west
Are nearly one to Begga 6 and my land
Whose haven 7 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,8
That now bears mine : for not with fiercer flame
Glow'd Belus' daughter,9 injuring alike
Sichseus and Creusa, than did I,
Long as it suited the unripen'd down
That fledged my cheek ; nor she of Rhodope,10
That was beguiled of Demophoon ; *

Nor Jove's son,11 when the charms of Iole
Were shrined within his heart. And yet there bides

alas semper adstantes non cessant clamare sanctus, sanctus, sanctus. Alberici
Visio, sec. 39.

six wings he wore to shade

His lineaments divine. Milton, P. L. b. 5. 278.

1 The valley of waters. ] The Mediterranean sea.

2 That.] The great ocean.

3 Discordant shores.'] Europe and Africa.

4 Meridian. ] Extending to the east, the Mediterranean at last reaches the
coast of Palestine, which is on its horizon when it enters the Straits of
Gibraltar. " Wherever a man is," says Vellutello, " there he has, above his
head, his own particular meridian circle."

5 'Tioixt Ebro's stream

And Macra's.] Ebro, a river to the west, and Macra, 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.

6 Begga.] A place in Africa.

7 Whose haven.] Alluding to the terrible slaughter of the Genoese made by
the Saracens in 936 ; for which event Vellutello refers to the history of
Augustino Giustiniani. Those, who conceive that our Poet speaks of Mar-
seilles, suppose the slaughter of its inhabitants made in the time of Julius
Caesar to be alluded to. It must however have been Genoa, as that place, and
not Marseilles, lies opposite to Buggea or Begga on the African coast. Fazio
degli Uberti describes Buggea as looking towards Majorca :

Vidi Buggea che ve di grande loda ;
Questa nel mare Maiorica guata. Dittamondb, lib. 5. cap. vi.

8 This heaven.] The planet Venus, by which Folco declares himself to have
been formerly influenced.

9 Belus' daughter.] Dido.

i° She of Rhodope.] Phyllis.
11 Jove's son.] Hercules.

100—130. PAKADISE, Canto IX. 373

No sorrowful repentance here, but mirth,

Not for the fault, (that doth not come to mind,)

But for the virtue, whose o'erruling sway

And providence have wrought thus quaintly. Here

The skill is look'd into, that fashioneth

With such effectual working,1 and the good

Discern'd, accruing to the lower world2

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 sunbeam doth

On the clear wave. Know then, the soul of Bahab 3

Is in that gladsome harbour ; to our tribe

United, and the foremost rank assign'd.

She to this heaven,4 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 ; 5

For that she favour'd first the high exploit

Of Joshua on the holy land, whereof

The Pope 6 recks little now. Tl^ city, plant

Of him,7 that on his Maker turn'd the back,

And of whose envying so much woe hath sprung,

Engenders and expands the cursed flower,8

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,9 as their stuft margins show,

1 With such effectual working.] All the editions, except the Nidobeatina,
do not, as Lombardi affirms, read "contanto;" for Vellutello's of 1544 is
certainly one exception.

2 To the lower world.] I have altered my former translation here, in com-
pliance with a reading adopted by Lombardi from the Nidobeatina : Perche '1
mondo instead of Perche al mondo. But the passage is still obscure.

3 Rahab.) Heb. xi. 31.

4 This heaven.] "This planet of Venus, at which the shadow of the earth
ends, as Ptolemy writes in his Almagest." Vellutello.

5 With either palm.] By both his hands nailed to the cross.

6 The Pojpe.] "Who cares not that the holy land is in the possession of the
Saracens." See also Canto xv. 136.

Ite superbi, 0 miseri Christiani
Consumando l'un l'altro ; e non vi caglia
Che '1 sepolcro di Cristo e in man di cani.

Petrarca, Trionfo della Fama, cap. ii.

7 Of him.] Of Satan.

8 The cursed flower.] The coin of Florence, called the Floren ; the covetous
desire of which has excited the Pope to so much evil.

9 The decretals.] The canon law. So in the De Monarchic, lib. 3. p. 137 :
"There are also a third set, whom they call Decretalists. These, alike

374 THE VISION. 131—137.

Are the sole study. Pope and Cardinals,
Intent on these, ne'er journey but in thought
To Nazareth, where Gabriel oped his wings.
Yet it may chance, ere long, the Vatican,1
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.

Looking 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,2 whereat

ignorant of theology and philosophy, relying wholly on their decretals, (which
I indeed esteem not unworthy of reverence,) in the hope I suppose of obtaining
for them a paramount influence, derogate from the authority of the empire.
Nor is this to be wondered at, when I have heard one of them saying, and
impudently maintaining, that traditions are the foundation of the faith of the
church." He proceeds to confute this opinion, and concludes "that the church
does not derive its authority from traditions, but traditions from the church : "
"necesse est, x;t non ecclesiaj a traditionibus, sed ab ecclesia traditionibus
accedat anthoritas." In accordance with the sentiments of Dante on this
point, the Church of England has framed that article, so well worthy of being
duly considered and carried into practice, which begins : " It is not necessary
that traditions and ceremonies be in all places one, or utterly like ; for at all
times they have been divers, and may be changed according to the diversity
of countries, times, and men's manners, so that nothing be ordained against
God's word." Article xxxiv.

1 The Vatican.] He alludes either to the death of Pope Boniface VIII., or,
as Venturi supposes, to the coming of the Emperor Henry VII. into Italy ; or
else, according to the yet more probable conjecture of Lombardi, to the transfer
of the holy see from Rome to Avignon, which took place in the pontificate of
Clement V.

2 The point.'] " To that part of heaven," as Venturi explains it, "in which
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 repercussion, as it
were, is here the strongest, because the velocity of each is increased to the
utmost by their respective distance from the poles. Such at least is the system
of Dante."

8—43. PARADISE, Canto X. 375

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 above2
Much virtue would be lost, and here on earth
All power well nigh extinct : or, from direct
Were its departure distant more or less,
I' 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,3
Which late we told of, the great minister 4
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,5 where'6 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

1 Oblique.] The zodiac.

2 In heaven above.] If the planets did not preserve that order in which they
move, they would not receive nor transmit their clue influences : and if the
zodiac were not thus oblique ; if towards the north it either passed, or went
short of the tropic of Cancer, or else towards the south it passed, or went short
of the tropic of Capricorn, it would not divide the seasons as it now does.

3 The part.] The above-mentioned intersection of the equinoctial circle and
the zodiac.

4 Minister.] The sun.

5 Along the sjjires.] According to our Poet's system, as the earth is motion-
less, the sun passes, by a spiral motion, from one tropic to the other.

6 Where.] In which the sun rises every day earlier after the vernal
equinox.

7 But as a man.] That is, he was quite insensible of it.

376 THE VISION. 44—85.

Hath ever travel'd % Such are they dwell here,
Fourth family l of the Omnipotent Sire,
Who of his spirit and of his offspring 2 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,
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. Nought 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.3 Who doth not prune his wing
To soar up thither, let him 4 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

1 Fourth family ,~\ The inhabitants of the sun, the fourth planet.

2 Of his sjnrit and of his offspring.] The procession of the third, and the
generation of the second person in the Trinity.

3 Such was the song.] The song of the spirits was ineffable. It was like a
jewel so highly prized, that the exportation of it to another country is pro-
hibited by law.

4 Let him.] Let him not expect any intelligence at all of that place, for it
surpasses description.

86—103. PARADISE, Canto X. 377

To slake thy thirst, no less constrained1 were,

Than water flowing not unto the sea.

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.

I, then,2 was of the lambs, that Dominic

Leads, for his saintly flock, along the way

Where well they thrive, not swoln with vanity.

He, nearest on my right hand, brother was,

And master to me : Albert of Cologne 3

Is this ; and, of Aquinum, Thomas4 I.

If thou of all the rest wouldst be assured,

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,5 who to either forum 6 lent

Such help, as favour wins in Paradise.

The other, nearest, who adorns our quire,

1 No less constrained.'] "The rivers might as easily cease to flow towards
the sea, as we could deny thee thy request."

2 /, then.] ' "I was of the Dominican order."

3 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 Dominican order. He then taught theology in various parts
of Germany, and particularly at Cologne. Thomas Aquinas was his favourite
pupil. In 1260, he reluctantly accepted the bishopric of Ratisbon, and in two
years after resigned it, and returned to his cell in Cologne,- where the remainder
of his life was passed in superintending the school, and in composing his
voluminous works on divinity 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 of it. Scriptores Ordinis Prozdi-
catorum, by Quetif and Echard, Lut. Par. 1719, fol. torn. i. p. 162. Frezzi
places Albertus Magnus next in rank to Aristotle :

Alberto Magno e dopo lui '1 secondo :
Egli suppli li membri, e 1 vestimento
Alia Filosofia in questo mondo. II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. ix.

4 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. 3. sec 9,) was born of noble parents, who anxiously but vainly endeavoured
to divert him from a life of celibacy and study. He died in 1274, at the age of
forty-seven. Echard and Quetif, ibid. p. 271. See also Purgatory, Canto xx.
v. 67. A modern French writer has collected some particulars relating to the
influence which the writings of Thomas Aquinas and Buonaventura had on the
opinions of Dante. See the third part of Ozanam's Dante et la Philosophic
Catholique ait treizieme siecle, 8°. Par. 1839.

5 Gratian.] " Gratian, a Benedictine 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 abridgment or epitome of canon law, drawn
from the letters of the pontifs, the decrees of. councils, and the writings of the
ancient doctors." Maclaine's Mosheim, vol. iii. cent. xii. part ii. cap. i. sec. 6.

6 To either forum.] "By reconciling," as Venturi explains it, "the civil
with the canon law."

378 THE VISION. 104—119.

Was Peter,1 lie that with the widow gave 2

To holy church his treasure. The fifth light,3

Goodliest of all, is by such love inspired,

That all your world craves tidings of his doom : 4

Within, there is a lofty light, endow'd

With sapience so profound, if truth be truth,

That with a ken of such wide amplitude

No second hath arisen. Next behold

That taper's radiance,5 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 G 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 7

1 Peter.] "Pietro Lombardo was of obscure origin, 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 afterwards 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." Tiraboschi, Storia della Lett. Ital. torn. iii. lib. 4.
cap. ii.

2 That with the widow gave.] This alludes to the beginning of the Liber
Sententiarum, where Peter says : " Cupiens aliquid de penuriS, ac tenuitate
nostra cum paupercula in gazophylacium domini mittere," etc.

3 The fifth light.] Solomon.

4 His doom.] It was a common question, it seems, whether Solomon were
saved or no.

5 That taper's radiance.] St. Dionysius, the Areopagite. "The famous
Grecian fanatic, who gave himself out for Dionysius the Areopagite, disciple of
St. Paul, and who, under the protection 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 contemplation,
lived most probably in this century (the fourth) ; though some place him
before, others after, the present period." Maclaine's Mosheim, vol. i. cent. iv.
p. ii. c. iii. sec. 12.

6 That pleader.] In the fifth century, Paulus Orosius "acquired a con-
siderable degree of reputation by the History he wrote to refute the cavils of
Pagans against Christianity, and by his books against the Pelagians and
Priscillianists." Ibid. vol. ii. cent. v. p. ii. c. ii. sec. 11. A similar train of
argument was pursued by Augustine, in his book De Civitate Dei. Orosius is
classed by Dante, in his treatise De Vulg. FAoq. lib. 2. cap. vi. as one of his
favourite authors, among those " qui usi sunt altissimas prosas," — "who have
written prose with the greatest loftiness of style." The others are Cicero,
Livy, Pliny, and Frontinus. Some commentators, with less probability,
suppose that this seventh spirit is Saint Ambrose, and not Orosius.

7 The eighth.] Boe'tius, whose book De Consolatione Philosophic excited
so much attention during the Middle Ages, was born, as Tiraboschi conjectures,
about 470. " In 524 he was cruelly put to death, by command of Theodoric,

120—142. PARADISE, Canto X. 379

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 ; l and from martyrdom

And exile came it here. Lo ! further on,

Where flames the ardurous spirit of Isidore ; 2

Of Bede ;3 and Richard,4 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 Sigebert5

Who 'scaped not envy, when of truth he argued,

Reading in the straw-litter'd street." 6 Forthwith,

As clock, that calleth up the spouse of God 7

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.

either on real or pretended suspicion of his being engaged in a conspiracy."
Delia Lett. Ital. torn. iii. lib. 1. cap. iv.

1 Cieldauro.] Boetius was buried at Pavia, in the monastery of St. Pietro
in Ciel d'oro.

2 Isidore.] He was Archbishop of Seville during forty years, and died in
635. See Mariana, Hist. lib. 6. cap. vii. Moslieim, whose critical opinions in
general must be taken with some allowance, observes, that "his grammatical
theological, and historical productions, discover more learning and pedantry
than judgment and taste."

3 Bede.] Bede, whose virtues obtained him the appellation of the Venerable,
was born in 672, at Wermouth and Jarrow, in the bishopric of Durham, and
died in 735. Invited to Rome by Pope Sergius I. , he preferred passing almost
the whole of his life in the seclusion of a monastery. A catalogue of his
numerous writings may be seen in Kippis's Biographkt, Britannica, vol. ii.

4 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,
intitled the Mystical Ark, which contains as it were the marrow of this kind
of theology, was received with the greatest avidity." Maclaine's Mosheim, vol.
iii. cent. xii. p. ii. c. ii. sec. 23.

5 Sigebert.] "A monk of the abbey of Gemblours, who was in high repute
at the end of the eleventh, and beginning of the twelfth century." Diet, de
Moreri.

6 The straw-litter'd street.] The name of a street in Paris : the " Rue de
Fouarre."

7 The spouse of God.] The church.

380 THE VISION. 1_32.

CANTO XI

Thomas Aquinas enters at large into the life and character of St. Francis ;
and then solves one of two difficulties, which he perceived to have risen in
Dante's mind from what he had heard in the last Canto.

0 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 2

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,3 that ere while 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
Thy thoughts, from whence they rise. 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 ; ' 4 and that ' no second such 6
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,0
Who with loud cries was 'spoused in precious blood,
Might keep her footing towards her well-beloved,7
Safe in herself and constant unto him,

1 Ofond anxiety of mortal men.'] Lucretius, lib. 2. xiv. :

0 miseras hominum mentes ! 0 pectora caeca !
Qualibus in tenebris vitae, quantisque periclis
Degitur hoc aevi quodcunque est !

2 Aphorisms.'] The study of medicine.

3 The lustre.] The spirit of Thomas Aquinas.

4 That 'well they thrive.'] See the last Canto, v. 93.
B ' No second such.'] See the last Canto, v. 111.

G She.] The church.

7 Her ivcll beloved.] Jesus Christ.

33—62. PAKADISE, Canto XI. 381

Hath two ordain'd, who should on either hand
In chief escort her : one,1 seraphic all
In fervency ; for wisdom upon earth,
The other,2 splendour 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,3 and the wave that falls
From blest Ubaldo's chosen hill, there hangs
Kich slope of mountain high, whence heat and cold 4
Are wafted through Perugia's eastern gate :
And Nocera with Gualdo, in its rear,
Mourn for their heavy yoke.5 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,6
To call things rightly, be it henceforth styled.
He was not yet much distant from his rising,
When his good influence 'gan to bless the earth.
A dame,7 to whom none openeth pleasure's gate
More than to death, was, 'gainst his father's will,8
His stripling choice : and he did make her his,
Before the spiritual court,9 by nuptial bonds,
And in his father's sight : from day to day,
Then loved her more devoutly. She, bereaved
Of her first husband,10 slighted and obscure,
Thousand and hundred years and more, remain'd
Without a single suitor, till he came.

1 One.] Saint Francis.

2 The other.'] Saint Dominic.

3 Tupino.'] Thomas Aquinas proceeds to describe the birthplace of Saint
Francis, between Tupino, a rivulet near Assisi, or Ascesi, where the saint was
born in 1182, and Chiascio, a stream that rises in a mountain near Agobbio,
chosen by Saint Ubaldo for the place of his retirement.

4 Heat and cold.] Cold from the snow, and heat from the reflection of
the sun.

5 Yoke.] Vellutello understands this of the vicinity of the mountain to
Nocera and Gualdo ; and Venturi (as I have taken it) of the heavy impositions
laid on those places by the Perugians. For giogo, like the Latin jugum, will
admit of either sense.

6 The East.] This is the east, and Juliet is the sun. Shakspeare.

7 A dame.] There is in the under church of St. Francis, at Assisi, a picture
painted by Giotto from this subject. It is considered one of the artist's best
works. See Kugler's Hand-book of the History of Painting, translated by a
lady. Lond. 1842, p. 48.

8 'Gainst his father's will.] In opposition to the wishes of his natural
father.

9 Before the spiritual court.] lie made a vow of poverty in the presence of
the bishop and of his natural father.

10 Her first husband.] Christ.

382 THE VISION. 63-90.

Nor aught avail'd, that, with Amyclas,1 she

"Was found unmoved at rumour of his voice,

Who shook the world : nor aught her constant boldne

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 2 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 3 bares him next, and next Sylvester,4

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 5

Girt humbly : nor did abjectness of heart

Weigh down his eyelids, for that he was son

Of Pietro Bernardone,0 and by men

In wonderous sort despised. But royally

His hard intention he to Innocent 7

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 marvelous life deservedly were sung

In heights empyreal ; through Honorius' 8 hand

1 Amyclas.] Lucan makes Caesar exclaim, on witnessing the secure poverty
of the fisherman Amyclas :

0 vitae tuta facultas

Pauperis, angustique lares ! 0 munera nondum

Intellecta deum ! quibus hoc contingere templis,

Aut potuit muris, nullo trepidare tumultu,

Caesarea pulsante manu ? Phars. lib. 5. 531.

0 happy poverty ! thou greatest good

Bestow'd by heaven, but seldom understood !

Here nor the cruel spoiler seeks his prey,

Nor ruthless armies take their dreadful way, etc. Rowe.

A translation in prose of these lines is introduced by our Poet in his Convito,

p. 170.

2 Bernard.] Of Quintavalle ; one of the first followers of the saint.

3 Egidius.'] The third of his disciples, who died in 1262. His work,
entitled Verba Aurea, was published in 1534, at Antwerp. See Lucas Wad-
dingus, Annates Ordinis Minor is, p. 5.

4 Sylvester.] Another of his earliest associates.

5 Whom now the cord.] Saint Francis 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.

6 Pietro Bernardone.] A man in an humble station of life at Assisi.

7 Innocent. ] Pope Innocent III.

8 Honorius.] His successor Honorius III., who granted certain privileges
to the Franciscans.

91—127. PAKADISE, Canto XI. 383

A second crown, to deck their Guardian's virtues,
Was by the eternal Spirit inwreath'd : and when
He had, through thirst of martyrdom, stood up
In the proud Soldan's presence,1 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,2
Twist Arno and the Tiber, he from Christ
Took the last signet,3 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 :4 and enjoin'd their love
And faith to her ; and, from her bosom, will'd
His goodly spirit should move forth, returning
To its app6inted kingdom ; nor would have
His body 5 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 6 was.
Therefore who follow him as he enjoins,
Thou mayst be certain, take good lading in.
But hunger of new viands tempts his flock ; 7
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, recal
To mind ; thy wish may be in part fulfill'd :
For thou wilt see the plant from whence they split ; 8

1 In the proud Soldan's presence.'] The Soldan of Egypt, before whom
Saint Francis is said to have preached.

2 On the hard rock.] The mountain Alverna in the Apennine.

3 The last signet.'] Alluding to the stigmata, or marks resembling the
wounds of Christ, said to have been found on the saint's body.

4 His dearest lady.] Poverty.

3 His body.] He forbad any funeral pomp to be observed at his burial ;
and, as it is said, ordered that his remains should be deposited in a place
where criminals were executed and interred.

6 Our Patriarch.] Saint Dominic, to whose order Thomas Aquinas belonged.

7 His flock.] The Dominicans.

8 The plant from ivhence they sjilit.] "The rule of their order, which the
Dominicans neglect to observe."

384 THE VISION. 128—129.

And he shall see, who girds him, what that means,1
'That well they thrive, not swoln with vanity.'"

CANTO XII.

Argument.

A second circle of glorified souls encompasses the first. Buonaventura, who
is one of them, celebrates the praises of Saint Dominic, and informs Dante
who the other eleven are, that are in this second circle or garland.

Soon as its final word the blessed flame 2
Had raised for utterance, straight the holy mill 3
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 splendour 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 voice4
"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,

1 And he shall see, v)ho girds him, what thqt means.] Lombardi, after the
Nidobeatina edition, together with four MSS., reads "il correggiar," or "il
coregier," which gives the sense that now stands in the text of this version.
The Dominicans might be called " coreggieri," from their wearing a leathern
girdle, as the Franciscans were called "cordiglieri," from their being girt with
a cord. I had before followed the common reading, " il corregger;" and
translated the line according to Venturi's interpretation of it :

Nor miss of the reproof which that implies.

2 The blessed flame.'] Thomas Aquinas.

3 The holy mill.] The circle of spirits.

4 In manner of that voice.] One rainbow giving back the image of the
other, as sound is reflected by Echo, that nymph, who was melted away by
her fondness for Narcissus, as vapour is melted by the sun. The reader will
observe in the text not only a second and third simile within the first, but two
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 encompassed, are by a bold figure termed two
garlands of never-fading roses. Indeed there is a fulness of splendour, even to
prodigality, throughout the beginning of this Canto.

21—44. PARADISE, Canto XII. 385

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 1 amongst the new lights 2 moved a voice,

That made me seem 3 like needle to the star,

In turning to its whereabout ; 4 and thus

Began : " The love,5 that makes me beautiful,

Prompts me to tell 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, thorough grace alone,

And not through its deserving. As thou heard'st,G

Two champions to the succour of his spouse

He sent, who by their deeds and words might join

Again his scatter'd people. In that clime 7

Where springs the pleasant west-wind to unfold

The fresh leaves, with which Europe sees herself

1 One.] Saint Buonaventura, general of the Franciscan order, in which he
effected some reformation ; and one of the most profound divines of his age.
" He refused the archbishopric of York, which was offered him by Clement
IV., but afterwards was r>revailed on to accept the bishopric of Albano and a
cardinal's hat. He was born at Bagnoregio or Bagnorea, in Tuscany, A.D.
1221, and died in 1274." Diet. Histor. par Chaudon et Delandine, ed. Lyon,
1804.

2 Amongst the new lights.'] In the circle that had newly surrounded the
first.

3 That made me seem.] " That made me turn to it, as the magnetic needle
does to the pole."

4 To its whereabout.] Al suo dove.

The very stones prate of my whereabout. Shakspeare, Macbeth, act. ii. sc. 1.

6 The love.] By an act of mutual courtesy, Buonaventura, a Franciscan, is
made to proclaim the praises of St. Dominic, as Thomas Aquinas, a Domin-
ican, 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 himself be-
longed. Even Macchiavelli, no great friend to the church, attributes the
revival of Christianity to the influence of these two saints. " Quanto alle
Sette, si vede ancora queste rinovazioni esser necessarie, per l'essempio della
nostra Religione, la quale, se non fusse stata ritirata verso il suo principio da
San Francesco e da San Domenico, sarebbe al tutto spenta." Discorsi sopra
la privia Deca di T. Livio, lib. 3. cap. i. " As to sects, it is seen that these
renovations are necessary, by the example of our religion, which, if it had not
been drawn back to its principle by St. Francis and St. Dominic, would be
entirely extinguished."

J] As thou heard' st.] See the last Canto, v. 33.

7 In that clime.] Spain.

2b

386 THE VISION. 45-69.

New-garmented ; nor from those billows * far,
Beyond whose chiding, after weary course,
The sun doth sometimes 2 hide him ; safe abides
The happy Callaroga,3 under guard
Of the great shield, wherein the lion lies
Subjected and supreme. And there was born
The loving minion of the Christian faith,4
The hallo w'd wrestler, gentle 3 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,6
It prophesied. When, at the sacred font,
The spousals were complete 'twixt faith and him,
Where pledge of mutual safety was exchanged,
The dame,7 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 labourer,
Whom Christ in his own garden chose to be
His help-mate. Messenger he seem'd, and friend
Fast-knit to Christ ; and the first love he show'd,
Was after the first counsel 8 that Christ gave.

1 Those billoios. ] The Atlantic.

2 Sometimes.] During the summer solstice.

3 Callaroga.] Between Osma and Aranda, in Old Castile designated by the
royal coat of arms.

4 The loving minion of the Christian 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,
given him in consequence of a vision by a noble matron who stood sponsor to
him, are all told in an anonymous life of the saint, said to be written in the
thirteenth century, and published by Quetif and Echard, Scriptores Ordinis
Prcedicatorum, Par. 1719, fol. torn. i. p. 25. These writers deny his having
been an inquisitor, and indeed the establishment of the inquisition itself before
the fourth Lateran Council. Ibid, p. 88.

5 Gentle.] B«^?«» txO°o!s kk.) ^t'xeitnv tuftivtj. Eurip. Medea, v. 805.

Lofty and sour to those, that loved him not,

But to those men, that sought him, sweet as summer.

Shakspeare, Henry VIII. act. iv. sc. 2.

6 In the mother's tvomb.] 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.

7 The dame.] His godmother's dream was, that he had one star in his fore-
head and another in the nape of his neck, from which he communicated light
to the east and the west.

8 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." Matt. xix. 21. Dominic is said to
have followed this advice.

70—89. PARADISE, Canto XII. 387

Many a time x his nurse, at entering, found
That he had risen in silence, and was prostrate,
As who should say, ' My errand was for this.'
0 happy father ! Felix 2 rightly named.
0 favour'd mother ! rightly named Joanna ;
If that do mean, as men interpret it.3
Not for the world's sake, for which now they toil
Upon Ostiense 4 and Taddeo's 5 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,G (whose bounty to the just
And needy is gone by, not through its fault,
But his who fills it basely,) he besought,
No dispensation 7 for commuted wrong,
Nor the first vacant fortune,8 nor the tenths
That to God's paupers rightly appertain,
But, 'gainst an erring and degenerate world,
Licence to fight, in favour of that seed 9

1 Many a time.] His nurse, when she returned to him, often found that he
had left his bed, and was prostrate, and in prayer.

2 Felix.] Felix Gusman.

3 As men interpret it.] Grace or gift of the Lord.

4 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 lectures on the five books of the Decretals.
He flourished about the year 1250. He is classed by Frezzi with Accorso the
Florentine :

Poi Ostiense, e'l Fiorentino Accorso,
Che fe le chiose, e dichiaro '1 mio testo,
E alle leggi diede gran soccorso. J I. Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. xiii.

5 Tacldeo.] It is uncertain whether he speaks of the physician or the lawyer
of that name. The former, Taddeo d'Alderotto, a Florentine, called the
Hippocratean, translated the ethics of Aristotle into Latin ; and died at an
advanced age towards the end of the thirteenth century. The other, who was of
Bologna, and celebrated for his legal knowledge, left no writings behind him.
He is also spoken of by Frezzi :

Azzo e Taddeo gik funno li maggiori ;
E ora ognun* e oscuro, e tal appare
Qual' e la luna alii febei splendori.

II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. xiii.

6 The see.] " The apostolic see, which no longer continues its wonted
liberality towards the indigent and deserving ; not indeed through its own
fault, as its doctrines are still the same, but through the fault of the pontiff,
who is seated in it."

7 No dispensation.] Dominic did not ask licence to compound for the use of
unjust acquisitions by dedicating a part of them to pious purposes.

8 Nor the first vacant fortune.] Not the first benefice that fell vacant.

9 In favour 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."

388 THE VISION. 90—124.

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.

" If such, one wheel l 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,2 ere my coming, hath declared
So courteously unto thee. But the track,3
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 4 in vain shall ask
Admittance to the barn. I question not 5
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.
Bonaventura'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 6 join me : two they were,
Among the first of those barefooted meek ones,
Who sought God's friendship in the cord : with them

1 One wheel.] Dominic ; as the other wheel is Francis.

2 Thomas.] Thomas Aquinas.

3 But the track.] " But the rule of St. Francis is already deserted : and the
lees of the wine are turned into mouldiness."

4 Tares.] He adverts to the parable of the tares and the wheat.

5 / 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
unnecessary rigour ; and at Acquasparta, in the territory of Todi, it had been
equally relaxed by the Cardinal Matteo, general of the order. Lucas
Waddingus, as cited by Lombardi, corrects the errors of tfee commentators who
had confounded these two.

6 Illuminato here,

And Agostino.] Two among the earliest followers of St. Francis.

125—130. PARADISE, Canto XII. 389

Hugues of Saint Victor ; x Pietro Mangiadore ; 2
And he of Spain3 in his twelve volumes shining ;
Nathan the prophet ; Metropolitan
Chrysostom ; 4 and Anselnio ; 5 and, who deign'd
To put his hand to the first art, Donatus.6
Raban 7 is here ; and at my side there shines

1 Hugues of St. Victor.'] Landino makes him of Pavia ; Venturi calls him a
Saxon ; and Lombardi, following Alexander Natalis, Hist. Heel. Sccc. xi. cap.
vi. art. 9, says that he was from Ypres. He was of the monastery of Saint
Victor at Paris, and died in 1142, at the age of forty-four. His ten books,
illustrative of the celestial hierarchy of Dionysius the Areopagite, according to
the translation of Joannes Scotus, are inscribed to King Louis, son of Louis le
Gros, by whom the monastery had been founded. Opera Hug. de. S. Vict,
fol. Paris, 1526, torn. i. 329. " A man distinguished by the fecundity of his
genius, 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 destitute of merit. " Maclaine's Mosheim, Eccl. Hist. vol. iii. cent,
xii. p. ii. c. ii. sec. 23, I have looked into his writings, and found some reason
for this high eulogium.

2 Pietro Mangiadore.] "Petrus Comestor, or the Eater, born at Troyes, was
canon and dean of that church, and afterwards chancellor of the church of
Paris. He relinquished these benefices to become a regular canon of St. Victor
at Paris, where he died in 1198." C'haudon et Delandine, Diet. Hist. ed.
Lyon. 1804. The work, by which he is best known, is his Historia Scolastica,
which I shall have occasion to cite in the Notes to Canto xxvi.

* He of Spain.] "To Pope Adrian V. succeeded John XXL, a native of
Lisbon ; a man of great genius and extraordinary acquirements, especially in
logic and in medicine, as his books written in the name of Peter of Spain, (by
which he was known before he became Pope,) may testify. His life was not
much longer than that of his predecessors, 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. Mariana, Hist. deEsp. lib. 14. cap. ii.
His Thesaurus Pauperum is referred to in Brown's Vulgar Errors, b. 7. ch. vii.

4 Chrysostom.] The eloquent Patriarch of Constantinople.

5 Anselnio.] " Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, was born at Aosta, about
1034, and studied under Lanfranc, at the monastery of Bee in Normandy,
where he afterwards devoted himself to a religious life, in his twenty-seventh
year. In three years he was made prior, and then abtot of that monastery ;
from whence he was taken, in 1093, to succeed 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. respect-
ing immunities and investitures. There is much depth and precision in his
theological works." Tiraboschi, Stor. Bella Lett. Ital. torn. iii. lib. 4. cap. ii.
Ibid. cap. v. " It is an observation made by many modern writers, that the
demonstration of the existence of God, taken from the idea of a Supreme
Being, of which Des Cartes is thought to be thea uthor, was so many ages back
discovered and brought to light by Anselm. Leibnitz himself makes the re-
mark, vol. v. Oper. p. 570, edit. Genev. 1768."

6 Donatus.] iElius Donatus, the grammarian, in the fourth century, one of
the preceptors of St. Jerome. So Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2.
cap. xiii. :

In questo tempo Donato vivea,
Che delle arti in si breve volume
L'uscio n'aperse e la prima scalea.

7 Raban.] " He was made Archbishop of Mentz in 847. His Latino-
Theotische Glossary of the Bible is still preserved in the imperial library at

390 THE VISION. 131—135.

Calabria's abbot, Joachim,1 endow'd

"With soul prophetic. The bright courtesy

Of friar Thomas and his goodly lore,

Have moved me to the blazon of a peer 2

So worthy ; and with me have moved this throng."

CANTO XIII.

3Mn>ttintnl

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.

Let him,3 who would conceive what now I saw,

Imagine, (and retain the image firm

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,

"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 botli

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.4 There was sung

Vienna. See Lambesius, Comment, de Bill. lib. 2. p. 41G and 932." Grays
Works, 4to, Loud 1814, vol. ii. p. 33. " Rabanus Maurus, Archbishop of
Mentz, is deservedly placed at the head of the Latin writers of this age. "
Mosheim, vol. ii. cent. ix. p. ii. c. ii. sec. 14.

1 Joachim.] Abbot of Flora in Calabria ; "whom the multitude revered as
a person divinely inspired, and equal to the most illustrious prophets of ancient
times." Mosheim, vol. iii. cent. xiii. p. xii. c. ii. sec. 33.

2 A peer.] St. Dominic.

3 Let him.] "Whoever would conceive the sight that now presented itself
to me, must imagine to himself fifteen of the brightest stars in heaven, together
with seven stars of Arcturus Major and two of Arcturus Minor, ranged in two
circles, one within the other, each resembling the crown of Ariadne, and
moving round in opposite directions. "

4 The Chiana.] See Hell, Canto xxix. 45.

22—54. PARADISE, Canto XIII. 391

No Bacchus, and no Io Paean, 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,1 in which the wondrous life
Of the meek man of God 2 was told to me ;
And thus it spake : "One ear3 o' 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,4 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 forin'd
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 5 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,6
Which passeth from his splendour, not disjoin'd
From him, nor from his love triune with them,7
Doth, through his bounty, congregate itself,

1 That luminary.] Thomas Aquinas.

2 The meek man of God.] Saint Francis. Sec Canto xi. 25.

3 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 nature is capable ; and therefore wonderest
at what has been said concerning Solomon."

4 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
pierced by the lance, made satisfaction for the sins of the whole world ; as
much wisdom resided, as human nature was capable of : and thou dost there-
fore wonder that I should have spoken of Solomon as the wisest." See
Canto x. 105.

5 That.] "Things, corruptible and incorruptible, are only emanations
from the archetypal idea residing in the Divine Mind."

6 Light] The Word : the Son of God.

7 His love triune with them,] The Holy Ghost.

392 THE VISION. 55-87.

Mirror'd, as 'twere, in new existences ; l
Itself unalterable, and ever one.

" Descending hence unto the lowest powers,2
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 molds it,3 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
Molded with nice exactness, and the heaven 4
In its disposing influence supreme,
The brightness of the seal 5 should be complete :
But nature renders it imperfect ever ;
Resembling thus the artist, in her work,
Whose faltering hand is faithless to his skill.
Therefore,6 if fervent love dispose, and mark
The lustrous image of the primal virtue,
There all perfection is vouchsafed ; and such
The clay 7 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 ;
1 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,

1 New existences.] Angels and human souls. If we read with some editions
and many MSS. "nove" instead of "nuove," it should be rendered "nine
existences," and then means "the nine heavens;" and this reading is ap-
proved by Lombardi, Biagioli, and Monti. In the terms " sussistenze " and
" contingenze," "existences and contingencies," Dante follows the language
of the scholastic writers, which I have endeavoured to preserve.

2 The lowest powers. ] Irrational life and brute matter.

3 Their wax, and that which molds it.] Matter, and the virtue or energy
that acts on it.

* The heaven.] The influence of the planetary bodies.

5 The brightness of the seal.] The brightness of the Divine idea before
spoken of.

6 Therefore.] Daniello, says Lombardi, has shown his sagacity in remark-
ing that our Poet intends this for a brief description of the Trinity : the primal
virtue signifving the Father ; the lustrous image, the Son ; the fervent love,
the Holy Ghost.

7 The clay.] Adam.

88—115. PARADISE, Canto XIII. 393

That thou mayst see, he was a king, who ask'd !
For wisdom, to the end he might be king
Sufficient : not, the number 2 to search out
Of the celestial movers ; or to know,
If necessary 3 with contingent e'er
Have made necessity ; or whether that
Be granted, that first motion4 is ; or if,
Of the mid circle,5 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 ken6 mayst learn,
At which the dart of my intention aims.
And, marking clearly, that I told thee, 'Bisen,'
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,
Both to the ' yea ' and to the ' nay ' thou seest not.
For he among the fools is down full low,
Whose affirmation, or denial,7 is
Without distinction, in each case alike.
Since it befals, that in most instances
Current opinion leans to false : and then
Affection bends the judgment to her ply.

1 Who ask'd.] "He did not desire to know the number of the celestial
intelligences, or to pry into the subtleties of logical, metaphysical, or
mathematical science : but asked for that wisdom which might fit him for his
kingly office."

- The number.] This question is discussed by our Poet himself in the
Convito, p. 49.

3 If necessary.] "If a premise necessarily true, with one not necessarily
true, ever produced a necessary consequence : a question resolved in the
negative by the art of logic, with that general rule, conclusio sequitur
debiliorem partem." Lombardi.

4 That first motion.] "If we must allow one first motion, which is not
caused by other motion : a question resolved affirmatively by metaphysics, ac-
cording to that principle, repugnat in causis processus in infinitum." Lom-
bardi.

5 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." Lombardi.

« That ken.] See Canto x. 110.

7 Whose affirmation, or denial.] TSv yet» Si^u SwveVsja «y rtt l/xeXoyio-ut, pi)

TfOffxv* tok fyifjt.ot.tri tm ¥Ov* , y roroXu tlBitrpiSoe, Qxvxt te xoti itrx'vtitrQcti. Plato,

Theastetusi id. Bip. vol. ii. p. 97. "For any one might make yet absurder
concessions than these, not paying strict attention to terms, according to the
way, in winch we are for the most part accustomed both to affirm and to deny."

394 THE VISION. 116—137.

" Much more than vainly doth he loose 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,1 and the crowd beside,
Who journey'd on, and knew not whither : so did
Sabellius, Arius,2 and the other fools,
Who, like to scymitars,3 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 not4 Dame Birtha and Sir Martin5 thence
Into heaven's counsels deem that they can pry :
For one of these may rise, the other fall."

CANTO XIV.

Argument.

Solomon, who is one of the spirits in the inner circle, declares what the ap-
pearance 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

1 Parmenides,

M issus, Bryso.] For the singular opinions entertained by the two
former of these heathen philosophers, see Diogenes Laertius, lib. 9., and
Aristot. De Ccelo, lib. 3. cap. i., and Phys. lib. 1. cap. ii. The last is also
twice adduced by Aristotle (Anal. Post. lib. 1. cap. ix., and Jihet. lib. 3.
cap. ii.) as affording instances of false reasoning. Our Poet refers to the
philosopher's refutation of them in the De Monarchid, lib. 3. p. 138. See
also Plato in the Theceteius, the Sophist, and the Parmenides.

2 Sibellius, Arius.'] Well-known heretics.

3 Scymitars.] A passage in the travels of Bertradon de la Brocquiere,
translated by Mr. Johnes, will explain this allusion, which has given some
trouble to the commentators. That traveller, Avho wrote before Dante,
informs us, p. 138, that the wandering Arabs used their scymitars as mirrors.

4 Let not.] " Let not short-sighted mortals presume to decide on the future
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 salvation
of Solomon. See Canto x. 107.

5 Dame Birtha and Sir Martin.] Names put generally for any persons
who have more curiosity than discretion.

1-36. PARADISE, Canto XIV. 395

here behold the souls of those, who had died fighting for the true faith,
ranged in the sign of a cross, athwart which the spirits move to the sound
of a melodious hymn.

From 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 x glanced into my mind,

As the great spirit of Aquinum ceased ;

And Beatrice, after liim, 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 substance blooms, shall stay with you

Eternally, as now ; and, if it doth,

How, when 2 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.3

Him,4 who lives ever, and for ever reigns
In mystic union of the Three in One,
Unbounded, bounding all, each spirit thrice
Sang, with such melody, as, but to hear,
For highest merit were an ample meed.
And from the lesser orb the goodliest light,5
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 ;

1 Such was the image.'] The voice of Thomas Aquinas proceeding from the
circle to the centre ; and that of Beatrice, from the centre to the circle.

2 When.] When ye shall be again clothed with your bodies at the resurrec-
tion.

3 That heavenly shower.] That effusion of beatific light.

4 Him] Literally translated by Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, book 5.

Thou one, two, and three eterne on live,
That raignest aie in three, two, and one,
Uncircumscript, and all maist circonscrive.

5 The goodliest light.] Solomon.

398 THE VISION. 37—83.

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 fervour, 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 splendour 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 ;
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 vision in 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, an holocaust I made
To God, befitting the new grace vouchsafed.

1 To more lofty bliss.] To the planet Mars.

84—109. PARADISE, Canto XIV. 397

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 splendours shot before me, that I cried,
" God of Sabaoth ! that dost prank them thus ! "

As leads the galaxy from pole to pole,
Distinguished into greater lights and less,
Its pathway,1 which the wisest fail to spell ;
So thickly studded, in the depth of Mais,
Those rays described the venerable sign,2
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,3 long or short,
To move along the sunbeam, whose slant line
Checkers the shadow interposed by art
Against the noontide heat. And as the chime

1 Its pathtvay.] See the Convito, p. 74 : "E da sapere," etc. " It must be
known, that, concerning the galaxy, philosophers have entertained different
opinions. The Pythagoreans say that the sun once wandered out of his way ;
and passing through other parts not suited to his heat, scorched the place
through which he passed ; and that there was left that appearance of the
scorching. I think they grounded their opinion on the fable of Phaeton,
which Ovid relates at the beginning of his Metamorphoses. Others (as Anaxa-
goras and Democritus) said that it proceeded from a partial repercussion of
the solar light, which they proved by such reasons as they could bring to
demonstrate it. What Aristotle has said, cannot well be known ; because his
meaning is not made the same in one translation as in another : and I think it
must have been an error in the translators ; for, in the new, he seems to say
that it is a collection of vapours under the stars, which they always attract in
that part ; and this appears devoid of any true reason. In the old, he says
that the galaxy is nothing else than a multitude of fixed stars in that part, so
small, that here below we cannot distinguish them ; but that they form the
appearance of that whiteness, which we call the galaxy. And it may be, that
the heaven in that part is dense, and therefore retains and represents that
light ; and in this opinion Avicen and Ptolemy seem to agree with Aristotle."
M. Letronne's remarks on this passage of the Convito, inserted in M. Artaud's
Ilistoire de Dante, (8°. Par. 1841, p. 157,) are worth consulting.

2 The venerable sign.] The cross, which is placed in the planet of Mars, to
denote the glory of those who fought in the crusades.

3 The atomies of bodies.]

As thick as motes in the sun-beame. Chaucer, edit. 1603, fol. 35.

As thick and numberless,
As the gay motes that people the sunbeam. Milton, II Penseroso.

398 THE VISION. 110—132.

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,1 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,2
Which grows in transport as we mount aloof.

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.

True love, that ever shows itself as clear

In kindness, as loose appetite in wrong,

Silenced that lyre harmonious, and still'd

The sacred cords, that are by heaven's right hand

Unwound and tighten'd. How to righteous prayers

1 He.] "He, who considers that the eyes of Beatrice became more radiant
the higher we ascended, must not wonder that I do not except even them, as I
had not yet beheld them since our entrance into this planet." Lombardi under-
stands, by " living seals," " vivi suggelli," " the stars ; " and this explanation
derives some authority from the Latin notes on the Monte Casino MS. " id est
coeli imprimentes ut sigilla."

2 Reveal'd.] Dischiuso. Lombardi explains this word " excluded," as
indeed Vellutello had done before him ; and as it is also used in the seventh
Canto. If this interpretation were adopted, the line should stand thus :

That holy pleasure not excluded here.
But the word is capable of either meaning ; and it would not be easy to
determine which is the right, in this passage.

6-46 PARADISE, Canto XV. 399

Should they not hearken, who, to give me will
For praying, in accordance thus were mute ?
He hath in sootli good cause for endless grief,
Who, for the love of thing that lasteth not,
Despoils himself for ever of that love.

As oft along the still and pure serene,
At nightfall, glides a sudden trail of fire,
Attracting with involuntary heed
The eye to follow it, erewhile at rest ;
And seems some star that shifted place in heaven,1
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 2 may claim) the pious ghost
Of old Anchises, in the Elysian bower,
"When he perceived his son. " 0 thou, my blood !

0 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

1 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 favour in my seed vouchsafed."

1 And seems some star that shifted place in heaven.]

Pare una stella che tramuti loco. Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 1. cap. xiii.

Ssepe etiam Stellas, vento impenclente, videbis,

Praecipites ccelo labi, noctisque per umbram

Flammarum longos a tergo albescere tractus. Virg. Georg. lib. 1. 367.

Compare Arat. Aiotrr.fjt,. 194.

2 Our greater muse.] Virgil, JEn. lib. G. 684 :

400 THE VISION. 47—79.

Then folio w'd : "No unpleasant thirst, though long,1

Which took me reading in the sacred book,

Whose leaves or white or dusky never change,

Thou hast allay'd, ray 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 ; 2

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 rae 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 ray ready answer stands decreed."

I turn'd me to Beatrice ; and she heard
Ere I had spoken, smiling an assent,
That to ray will gave wings ; and I began :
" To each among your tribe,3 what time ye kenn'd
The nature, in whom nought 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 ;

Isque ubi tendentem adversum per gramina vidit
^Enean, alacris palmas utrasque tetendit.
Venisti tandem, tuaque spectata parenti
Vicit iter durum pietas ?

1 No un feasant thirst, though long.] "Thou hast satisfied the long yet
pleasing desire which I have felt to see thee, through my knowledge of thee,
obtained in the immutable decrees of the divine Providence."

2 Unity.] Yla.vTaiv agx ro In t£zjto» yiyoti ruiv oc^iduhv Ix^toiv. Plato, Par-

menides, ed. Bip. vol. x. p. 130. Perhaps the mention of Parmenides
in the last Canto but one, suggested this thought to Dante, which he
has expressed by specifying two particular numbers intended to stand for all.
There is something similar to it in his treatise Be Vulgari Eloquio, lib. 1. cap.
xvi. : Sicut in numero cuncta mensurantur uno, et plura vel pauciora dicuntur,
secundum quod distant ab uno, vel ei propinquant.

3 To each among your tribe."] " In you, glorified spirits, love and knowledge
are made equal, because they are equal in God. But with us mortals it is
otherwise, for we have often the will without the means of expressing our
affections ; and I can therefore thank thee only in my heart."

80—100. PARADISE, Canto XV. 401

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."

" I am thy root,1 0 leaf ! whom to expect
Even, hath pleased me." Thus the prompt reply
Prefacing, next it added : " He, of whom 2
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,3 within her ancient limit-mark,
Which calls her still 4 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 5 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 G of its family : nor yet had come
Sardanapalus,7 to exhibit feats
Of chamber prowess. Montemalo 8 yet
O'er our suburban turret 9 rose ; as mucli
To be surpast in fall, as in its rising.
I saw Bellincion Berti 10 walk abroad '

1 / am thy root.] Cacciaguida, father to Alighieri, of whom our Poet was the
great-graudson.

2 He, of whom.] "Thy great-grandfather, Alighieri, has been in the first
round of Purgatory more than a hundred years ; and it is fit that thou
by thy good deserts shouldst endeavour to shorten the time of his remaining
there." For what is known of Alighieri see Pelli, Memor. Opere di Dante,
ediz. Zatta, 1758, torn. iv. P. 2da p. 21. 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. Pelli, ibid.

3 Florence.] See G. Villani, lib. 3. cap. ii.

4 Which calls her still.] The public clock being still within the circuit of
the ancient walls.

5 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. Or he may mean that
houses were not formerly built merely for pomp and show, nor of greater size
than was necessary for containing the families that inhabited them. For it has
been understood in both these ways.

7 Sardanapalus.] The luxurious monarch of Assyria. Juvenal is here
imitated, who uses his name for an instance of effeminacy. Sat. x. 362.

8 Montemalo.] Either an elevated spot between Rome and Viterbo ; or
Monte Mario, the site of the villa Mellini, commanding a view of Rome.

9 Our surburban turret.] Uccellatojo, near Florence, from whence that city
was discovered. Florence had not yet vied with Rome in the grandeur of her
public buildings.

10 Bellincion Berti.] Hell, Canto xvi. 38, and Notes. There is a curious

2C

402 THE VISION. 107—129.

In leathern girdle, and a clasp of bone ;

And, with no artful colouring on her cheeks,

His lady leave the glass. The sons I saw

Of Nerli, and of Vecchio,1 well content

With unrobed jerkin ; and their good dames handling

The spindle and the flax : 0 happy they !

Each 2 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 3 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 4 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.

description of the simple manner in which the earlier Florentines dressed
themselves, in G. Villani, lib. 6. cap. lxxi : " 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 them-
selves 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 common 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 magnificent one ; and the
young women were for the most part twenty years old or more before they
were given in marriage. Such was the dress ; and thus coarse were the
manners of the Florentines : 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 refinement and wealth."

1 Of Nerli, and of Vecchio.] Two of the most opulent families in Florence.

2 Each.] " None fearful either of dying in banishment, or of being deserted
by her husband on a scheme of traffic in France."

3 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 variance. " We should have held an aban-
doned character, like these, as great a wonder, as ye would the contrary now."
There is a sonnet by Lapo Salterello in Corbinelli's collection printed with the
Bella Mano, ed. Firenze, 1715, p. 150.

4 Mary.] The Virgin was invoked in the pains of child-birth. Purgatory,
Oanto xx. 21.

130-140. PARADISE, Canto XVI. 403

" From Valdipado l came to me my spouse ;
And hence thy surname grew. I follow'd then
The Emperor Conrad : 2 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,3 by the shepherd's fault, possess
Your right usurp'd. There I by that foul crew
Was disentangled from the treacherous world
Whose base affection many a spirit soils ;
And from the martyrdom came to this peace."

CANTO XVI.

^raument.

Cacciaguida relates the time of his birth ; and, describing the extent cf
Florence when he lived there, recounts the names of the chief families who
then inhabited it. Its degeneracy, and subsequent disgrace, he attributes
to the introduction of families from the neighbouring country and villages,
and to their mixture with the primitive citizens.

0 slight respect of man's nobility !

1 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 shortened ; for that Time,

Unless thou be eked out from day to day,

Goes round thee with his shears. Resuming then,

With greeting 4 such as Rome was first to bear,

But since hath disaccustom'd, I began :

And Beatrice,5 that a little space

Was sever'd, smiled ; reminding me of her,

1 Valdipado.] Cacciaguida's wife, whose family name was Alighieri, came
from Ferrara, called Val di Pado, from its being watered by the Po.

2 Conrad.'] The Emperor Conrad III. who died in 1152. See G. Villain,
lib. 4. xxxiv.

3 Whose people.] The Mahometans, who were left in possession of the
Holy Land, through the supineness of the Pope. See Canto ix. 123.

4 With greeting.] The Poet, who had addressed the spirit, not knowing
him to be his ancestor, with a plain " Thou," now uses more ceremony, and
calls him " You," according to a custom introduced among the Romans in the
latter times of the empire.

5 Beatrice.] Lombardi observes, that in order to show us that his conversa-
tion with Cacciaguida had no connexion with sacred subjects, Beatrice is de-
scribed as standing at a little distance ; and her smiling at his formal address to
his ancestor, makes him fall into a greater freedom of manner. See the next
Canto, v. 15.

404 THE VISION. 14—37.

Whose cough embolden'd (as the story holds)
To first offence the doubting Guenever.1

" 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 honour'd stem ! what ancestors
Were those you sprang from, and what years were mark'd
In your first childhood ? Tell me of the fold,2
That hath Saint John for guardian, what was then
Its state, and who in it were highest seated ! "

As embers, at the breathing of the wind,
Their flame enliven ; so that light I 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 ansvver'd : " From the day,3 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,

1 Guenever.] Beatrice's smile reminded him of the female servant who, hj
her coughing, emboldened Queen Guenever to admit the freedoms of Lancelot.
See Hell, Canto v. 124.

2 The fold.] Florence, of which John the Baptist was the patron saint.

3 From the day.] From the incarnation of our Lord to the birth of Caccia-
guida, the planet Mars had returned five hundred and eighty times to the con-
stellation of Leo, with which it is supposed to have a congenial influence. As
Mars then completes his revolution in a period forty -three days short of two
years, Cacciaguida was born about 1090. This is Lombardi's computation, and
it squares well both with the old reading —

cinquecento cinquanta

E trenta fiate ;
and with the time when Cacciaguida might have fallen fighting under Conrad
III., who died in 1152. Not so the computation made by the old commentators
in general, who, reckoning two years for the revolution of Mars, placed the
birth of Cacciaguida in 1160 : the impossibility of which being perceived by the
Academicians della Crusca, (as it had before been by Pietro, the son of our
Poet, or by the author of the commentary which passes for his.) they altered
the word " trenta " into " tre," " thirty " into "three ; " and so, still reckoning
the revolution of Mars at two years, brought Cacciaguida's birth to 1106. The
way in which Lombardi has got over the difficulty appears preferable, as it
retains the old reading ; and I have accordingly altered the translation, which
before stood thus :

this fire had come,

Five hundred fifty times and thrice, its beams
To re-illumine underneath the foot
Of its own lion.
Since this note was written, Monti has given his assent to Lombardi's opinion.
See his Proposta under the word "Binfiammare," t. iii. ptc ii. 210.

38—63. PARADISE, Canto XVI. 405

And I, Lad there our birth-place, where the last l

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 honourable

It is to pass in silence than to tell.

All those, who at that time were there, betwixt

Mars 2 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,3

Ran purely through the last mechanic's veins.

0 how much better were it, that these people 4

Were neighbours 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,5 him,

That, hath his eye already keen for bartering.0

Had not the people,7 which of all the world

Degenerates most, been stepdame unto Ccesar,

But, as a mother to her son been kind,

Such one, as hath become a Florentine,

And trades and traffics, hath been turn'd adrift

To Simifonte,8 where his grandsire plied

The beggar's craft : the Conti were possest

Of Montemurlo 9 still : the Cerchi still

1 The last.] The city was divided into four compartments. The Elisei, the
ancestors of Dante, resided near the entrance of that, named from the Porta
S. Piero, which was the last reached by the competitor in the annual race at
Florence. See G. Villani, lib. 4. cap. x.

2 Mars.] The Padre d'Aquino understands this to refer to the population
of Florence in Guido's time ; for, according to him, " tra Marte e'l Batista,"
means the space between the statue of Mars placed on the Ponte Vecchio and
the Baptistery ; and Lombardi assents to this interpretation. Venturi supposes,
that the portion of land so described would have been insufficient to hold the
population which Florence contained at the supposed date of this poem, that
is, in the year 1300 ; and agrees with the elder commentators, who consider
the description as relating to time and not to place, and as indicating the two
periods of heathenism and Christianity. See Canto xiii. 144. It would not be
easy to determine the real sense of a passage thus equivocal.

3 Campi and Certaldo and Fighine.] Country places near Florence.

4 That these people.] "That the inhabitants of the above-mentioned places
had not been mixed with the citizens ; nor the limits of Florence extended
beyond Galluzzo and Trespiano."

5 Aguglione's hind, and Signa's.] Baldo of Aguglione, and Bonifazio of Signa.

6 His eye already keen for bartering.] See Hell, Canto xxi. 40, and Note.

7 Had not the people.] If Kome had contiuued in her allegiance to the
emperor, and the Guelph and Ghibelline factions had thus been prevented ;
Florence would not have been polluted by a race of upstarts, nor lost the most
respectable of her ancient families.

8 Simifonte.] A castle dismantled by the Florentines. G. Villani, lib. 5.
cap. xxx. The person here alluded to is no longer known.

9 Montemurlo.] G. Villani, lib. 5, cap. xxxi., relates that the Conti Guidi,

406 THE VISION. 64—94.

"Were in Acone's parish. : nor had haply

From Valdigrieve past 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 x falls with a steeper plunge,

Than the blind lamb : and oftentimes one sword

Doth more and better execution,

Than five. Mark Luni ; Urbisaglia 2 mark ;

How they are gone ; and after them how go

Chiusi and Sinigaglia ! 3 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 4

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,fi Catilini, and Filippi,

The Alberichi, Greci, and Ormanni,

Now in their wane, illustrious citizens ;

And great as ancient, of Sannella him,

With him of Area saw, and Soldanieri,

And Ardinghi, and Bostichi. At the poop c

That now is laden with new felony

So cumbrous it may speedily sink the bark,

The Ravignani sat, of whom is sprung

not being able to defend their castle from the Pistoians, sold it to the state of
Florence.

1 The blind bull.] So Chaucer, Troll us and Creseide, b. 2. :

For swifter course cometh thing that is of wight
When it descendeth than done things light.
Compare Aristotle, Ethic. Nic. lib. 6. cap. xiii : " a-ufj.ix.Tt lo-x^, *• r- *••"

2 Luni; Urbisaglia.'] Cities formerly of importance, but then fallen to
decay.

3 Chiusi and Sinigaglia.] The same.

4 As the moon.] " The fortune of ns, that are the moon's men, doth ebb and
flow like the sea." Shakspeare, 1 Henry IV. act i. sc. 2.

5 The Ughi.] Whoever is curious to know the habitations of these and the
other ancient Florentines, may consult G. Villani, lib. 4.

6 At the poop.] The Cerchi, Dante's enemies, had succeeded to the houses
over the gate of Saint Peter, formerly inhabited by the Ravignani and the
Count Guido. G. Villani, lib. 4. cap. x. Many editions read porta, "gate."
— The same metaphor is found in iEschylus, Supp. 356, and is there also scarce
understood by the critics :

Respect these wreaths, that crown your city's poop.

95—122. PARADISE, Canto XVI. 407

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,1 in his house :

The column, clothed with verrey,2 still was seen

Unshaken ; the Sacchetti still were great,

Giouchi, Sifanti, Galli, and Barucci,

With them 3 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 4 yet were drawn.

How mighty them 5 I saw, whom, since, their pride

Hath undone ! And in all their goodly deeds

Florence was, by the bullets of bright gold,6

O'erflourish'd. Such the sires of those,7 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,8

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 9 had descended

Into the mart from Fesole : and Giuda

And Infangato 10 were good citizens.

1 Tlie gilded hilt and pommel.] The symbols of knighthood.

2 The column, clothed with verrey. ] The arms of the Pigli, or, as some write
it, the Billi.

3 With them.] Either the Chiaramoutesi, or the Tosinghi ; one of which
had committed a fraud in measuring out the wheat from the public granary.
See Purgatory, Canto xii. 99.

* Sizii and Arrigucci.] " These families still obtained the magistracies."

5 Them.] The Uberti ; according to the Latin note on the Monte Casino
MS. , with which the editor of the extracts from those notes says that Ben-
veuuto agrees.

6 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.

7 The sires of those.] " Of the Visdomini, the Tosinghi, and the Cortigiani,
who, being sprung from the founders of the bishopric of Florence, are the
curators of its revenues, which they do not spare, whenever it becomes vacant."

8 The o'enoeening brood.] The Adimari. This family was so little esteemed,
that Ubertino Donato, who had married a daughter of Bellincion Berti,
himself indeed derived from the same stock, (see Note to Hell, Canto xvi. 38,)
was offended with his father-in-law, for giving another of his daughters in
marriage to one of them.

9 Cajjoyisacco.] The family of Capon sacchi, who had removed from Fesole,
lived at Florence in the Mercato Vecchio.

10 Giuda

And Infangato.] Giuda Guidi and the family of Infangati.

.408 , THE VISION. 123—145.

A thing incredible I tell, though true : 1

The gateway,2 named from those of Pera, led

Into the narrow circuit of your walls.

Each one, who bears the sightly quarterings

Of the great Baron,3 (he whose name and worth

The festival of Thomas still revives,)

His knighthood and his privilege retain'd ;

Albeit one,4 who borders them with gold,

This day is mingled with the common herd.

In Borgo yet the Gualterotti dwelt,

And Importuni : 5 well for its repose,

Had it still lack'd of newer neighbourhood.0

The house,7 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 honour'd ; it, and those consorted with it.

O Buondelmonti ! what ill counseling

Prevail'd on thee to break the plighted bond %

Many, who now are weeping, would rejoice,

Had God to Ema s given thee, the first time

Thou near our city earnest. But so was doom'd :

Florence ! on that maim'd stone 9 which guards the bridge,

The victim, when thy peace departed, fell.

1 A thing incredible I tell, though true.] Io diro cosa incredibile e vera.

'Ey& rot £»£. itpyj, S lux^Ttru, Krurrev f*h vr, rout Oiovs, ot\*i9\; 3e. Plato, ThectgeS,

Bipont edit. torn. ii. p. 23.

2 Tlie gateway.'] Laudino refers this to the smallness of the city : Velhitello,
with less probability, to the simplicity of the people in naming one of the gates
after a private family.

3 The great Baron.] The Marchese Ugo, who resided at Florence as
lieutenant of the Emperor Otho III., gave many of the chief families licence
to bear his arms. See G. Villani, lib. 4. cap. ii., where the vision is related,
in consequence of which he sold all his possessions in Germany, and founded
seven abbeys ; in one whereof, his memory 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 punishment, and that the soul of the Marquis 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."

4 One.] Giano della Bella, belonging to one of the families thus distinguished,
who no longer retained his place among the nobility, and had yet added to his
arms a bordure or. See Macchiavelli, 1st. Fior. lib. 2. p. 86, ediz. Giolito.

5 Gualterotti dwelt,

And Importuni.] Two families in the compartment of the city called Borgo.

6 Newer neighbourhood.] Some understand this of the Bardi ; and others,
of the Buondelmonti.

7 The house.] Of Amidei. See Notes to Canto xxviii. of Hell, 102.

8 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 Montebuono to
Florence."

9 On that maim'd stone.] See Hell, Canto xiii. 144. Near the remains of the

146-151. PARADISE, Canto XVII. 409

" With these and others like to them, I saw
Florence in such assured tranquillity,
She had no cause at which to grieve : with these
Saw her so glorious and so just, that ne'er
The lily x from the lance had hung reverse,
Or through division been with vermeil dyecL"

CANTO XVII.

Argument.

Cacciaguida predicts to our Poet his exile and the calamities he had to suffer ;
and, lastly, exhorts him to write the present poem.

Such as the youth,2 who came to Clymene,

To certify himself of that reproach

Which had- been fasten'd on him, (he whose end,

Still makes the fathers chary to their sons,)

E'en such was I ; nor unobserved was such

Of Beatrice, and that saintly lamp,3

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,4

And men may mingle for thee when they hear."

" 0 plant, from whence I spring ! revered and loved !
Who soar'st so high a pitch, that thou as clear,5
As earthly thought determines two obtuse
In one triangle not contain'd, so clear
Dost see contingencies, ere in themselves
Existent, looking at the point 6 whereto
All times are present ; I, the whilst I scaled
With Virgil the soul-purifying mount 7

statue of Mars, Buondelmonti was slain, as if he had been a victim to the god ;
and Florence had not since known the blessing of peace.

1 The lily.] " The arms of Florence had never hung reversed on the spear
of her enemies, in token of her defeat ; nor been changed from argent to gules ; "
as they afterwards were, when the Guelfi gained the predominance.

2 The youth.] Phaeton, who came to his mother Clymene, to inquire of her
if he were indeed the son of Apollo. See Ovid, Met. lib. 1. ad finem.

3 That saintly lamp.] Cacciaguida.

4 To own thy thirst.] " That thou mayst obtain from others a solution of
any doubt that may occur to thee."

5 That thou as clear.] " Thou beh oldest future events with the same clear-
ness of evidence tbat we discern the simplest mathematical demonstrations."

6 The point.] The divine nature.

7 The soul-purifying mount.] See Purg. Canto viii. 133, and Canto xi. 140.

410 THE VISION. 22—50.

And visited the nether world 1 of woe,

Touching my future destiny have heard

"Words grievous, though I feel me on all sides

Well squared 2 to fortune's blows. Therefore my will

"Were satisfied to know the lot awaits me.

The arrow,3 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,4 whose verge extendeth not
Beyond the tablet of your mortal mold,
Is all depictured in the eternal sight ;
But hence deriveth not necessity,3
More than the tall ship, hurried down the flood,
Is driven by the eye that looks on it.
From thence,6 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 stepdame's 7 wiles,
Hippolytus departed ; such must thou
Depart from Florence. This they wish, and this
Contrive, and will ere long effectuate, there,8
"Where gainful merchandize is made of Christ

1 The 7iether world.] See Hell, Canto x. 77, and Canto xv. 61.

2 Well squared.] See Plato, Protagoras, ed. Bipont, vol. iii. p. 145, and
Aristot. Rhetor, lib. 3., where Pietro Vettori, in his Commentary, p. 656, re-
marks: "Quis nescit Dantem etiam suo in poemate tetragonnm vocasse
apposite hominem, qui adversis casibus non frangitur sed resistit fortiter ipsis ? "

* The arrow.] A line repeated by Ruccellai in his Oreste.

Nam praevisa minus kedere tela solent. Ovid.

Che piaga antiveduta assai men duole. Petrarca, Trionfo del Tempo.
4 Contingency.] La contingenza, che fuor del quaderno
Delia vostra materia non si stende.
I had before understood this, " Contingency, which is not exposed to view on
the tablet of your nature," " which is not discoverable by your human under-
standing," and had translated it accordingly ; but have now adopted
Lombardi's explanation : " Contingency, which has no place beyond the
limits of the material world."

3 Necessity.] " The evidence with which we see casual events pourtrayed in
the source of all truth, no more necessitates those events, than does the image,
reflected in the sight by a ship sailing down a stream, necessitate the motion
of the vessel."

6 From thence.] " From the eternal sight ; the view of the Deity himself."

7 His cruel stepdame.] Phoedra.

8 There.] At Rome, where the expulsion of Dante's party from Florence
was then plotting, in 1300.

51—82. PARADISE, Canto XVII. 411

Throughout the live-long clay. The common cry,
Will, 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 thing2
Beloved most dearly : this is the first shaft
Shot from the bow of exile. Thou shalt prove
How salt the savour 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,3 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 4 courtesy, who bears,
Upon the ladder perch'd, the sacred bird.
He shall behold thee with such kind regard,
That 'twixt ye two, the contrary to that
Which 'fals 'twixt other men, the granting shall
Forerun the asking. With him shalt thou see
That mortal,5 who was at his birth imprest
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 compast him about.
But, ere the Gascon 6 practise on great Harry,7
Sparkles of virtue shall shoot forth in him,
In equal scorn 8 of labours and of gold.

1 The common cmj.] The multitude will, as usual, be ready to blame those
who are sufferers, whose cause will at last be vindicated by the overthrow of
their enemies.

2 Thou shalt leave each thing.] Compare Euripid. Phocn. 399, etc.

3 Theirs.] " They shall be ashamed of the part they have taken against
thee." Lombardi, I think, is very unhappy in his conjecture, that rotta la
tempia, a reading of the Nidobeatina edition, should be adopted, and that it
may mean "the broken heads of his companions."

* 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. For an account of the
rise of this family from a very mean condition, see G. Villani, lib. 11. cap. xciv.

5 That mortal.] Can Grande della Scala, bom 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.

6 The Gascon.] Pope Clement V. See Hell, Canto xix. 86, and Note, and
Par. Canto xxvii. 53. and Canto xxx. 141.

7 Great Harry.] The Emperor Henry VII. See Canto xxx. 135.

8 In equal scorn.] See Hell, Canto i. 98.

412 THE VISION. 83—124.

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 ;

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 neighbours : 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 x
Most dear to me, I may not lose myself2
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 treasure3 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.

1 The place] Our Poet here discovers both that Florence, much as he
inveighs against it, was still the dearest object of his affections, and that it
was not without some scruple he indulged his satirical vein.

2 I may not lose myself.] "That being driven out of my country, I may not
deprive myself of every other place by the boldness, with which I expose in my
writings the vices of mankind."

3 The treasure.'] Cacciaguida.

125—135. PARADISE, Canto XVIII. 413

What though, when tasted first, thy voice shall prove

Unwelcome : on digestion, it will turn

To vital nourishment. The cry thou raisest,1

Shall, as the wind doth, smite the proudest summits

"Which is of honour 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.

^Vrnumcnt.
Dante sees the souls of many renowned warriors and crusaders in the planet
Mars ; and then ascends with Beatrice to Jupiter, the sixth heaven, in
which he finds the souls of those who had administered justice rightly in
the world, so disposed, as to form the figure of an eagle. The Canto con-
cludes with an invective against the avarice of the clergy, and especially
of the Pope.

Now 2 in his word, sole, ruminating, joy'd
That blessed spirit : and I fed on mine,
Tempering the sweet with bitter.3 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 turnld ;
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

1 The cry thou raisest.] "Thou shalt stigmatize the faults of those who are
most eminent and powerful ; for men are naturally less moved by instances,
adduced from among those who are in the lower classes of life."
a Sow.] The spirit of Cacciaguida enjoyed its own thoughts in silence.
3 Tempering the siveet with bitter.']

Chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy.

Shakspeare, As you Like it, act iii. scene 3.

414 THE VISION. 21—43.

The affection mark'd, when that its sway hath ta'en

The spirit wholly ; thus the hallow'd light,1

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,2 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 splendour gliding ; nor, the word was said,

Ere it was done : then, at the naming, saw,

Of the great Maccabee,3 another move

With whirling speed ; and gladness was the scourge

Unto that top. The next for Charlemain 4

And for the peer Orlando, two my gaze

Pursued, intently, as the eye pursues

A falcon flying. Last, along the cross,

William, and Renard,5 and Duke Godfrey c drew

1 The hallow'' d light.] In which the spirit of Cacciaguida was enclosed.

2 On this fifth lodgment of the tree.] Mars, the fifth of the heavens.

3 The great Maccabee.] Judas Maccabeus.

4 Charlemain.] L. Pulci commends Dante for placing Charlemain and
Orlando here :

Io mi confido ancor molto qui a Dante,
Che non sanza cagion nel ciel su misse
Carlo ed Orlando in quelle croci sante,
Che come diligente intese e scrisse.

Morg. Magg. c. xxviii.

5 William, and Renard.] Probably, not, as the commentators have
imagined, William II. of Orange, and his kinsman Raimbaud, two of the
crusaders under Godfrey of Bouillon, (Maimbourg, Hist, des Croisades, ed.
Par. 1682, 12mo, torn. i. p. 96,) but rather the two more celebrated heroes in
the age of Charlemain. The former, William I. of Orange, supposed to have
been the founder of the present illustrious family of that name, died about
808, according to Joseph de la Pise, Tableau de VHist. des Princes et
Principaute d'Orange. Our countryman, Ordericus Vitalis, professes to give
his tnie life, which had been misrepresented in the songs of the itinerant
bards : " Vulgo canitur a joculatoribus de illo cantilena ; sed jure prasferenda
estrelatio autentica." Eccl. Hist, in Duchesne, Hist. Normann. Script, p. 598.
The latter is better known by having been celebrated by Ariosto, under the
name of Rinaldo.

6 Duke Godfrey.] Godfrey of Bouillon.

Poi venia solo il buon duce Goffrido,
Che fe l'impresa santa e i passi giusti ;
Questo, di ch' io mi sdegno e'ndarno grido,

Fece in Hierusalem con le sue mani

II mal guardato e gia negletto nido.

Petrarca, Tr. delta Fama, cap. ii.

44—81. PARADISE, Canto XVIII. 415

My ken, and Robert Guiscarcl.1 And the bouI
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,
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 2 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 lengthened 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. 0 nymph divine,3
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,4

1 Robert Guiscard.] See Hell, Canto xxviii. 12.

'Through silvery .] So in the Convito, "E'l ciel di Giove," etc. p. 74.
"The heaven of Jupiter maybe compared to geometry, for two properties:
the one is, that it moves between two heavens repugnant to its temperature,
as that of Mars and that of Saturn ; whence Ptolemy, in the above-cited book,
says that Jupiter is a star of temperate complexion, between the coldness of
Saturn and the heat of Mars : the other is, that, among all the stars, it shows
itself white, as it were silvered."

3 0 nymph divine.'] " 0 muse, thou that makest thy votaries glorious and
long-lived, as they, assisted by thee, make glorious and long-lived the cities
and realms which they celebrate, now enlighten me," etc.

4 The characters.'] Diligite justitiam qui judicatis terram. " Love righteous-
ness, ye that be judges of the earth." Wisdom of Solomon, c. i. 1.

416 THE VISION. 82—123.

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 terrain. 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 ; l

Thus more than thousand twinkling lustres hence

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,2

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,3 that seem'd

Erewhile, with lilted 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 4
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 !
0 beg ye grace for those, that are, on earth,
All after ill example gone astray.
War once had for his instrument the sword :

1 The umvise.] Who augur future riches to themselves in proportion to the
quantity of sparks that fly from the lighted brand when it is shaken.

2 Who painteth there.] The Deity himself.

3 Beatitude.] The band of spirits; for "beatitudo" is here a noun of
multitude.

4 That once more.] " That he may again drive out those who buy and sell
in the temple."

124—132. PARADISE, Canto XIX. 417

But now 'tis made, taking the bread away,1
Which the good Father locks from none. — And thou,
That writest but to cancel,2 think, that they,
Who for the vineyard, which thou wastcst, (lied,
Peter and Paul, live yet, and mark thy doings.
Thou hast good cause to cry, " My heart so cleaves
To him,3 that lived in solitude remote,
And for a dance 4 was dragg'd to martyrdom,
I wist not of the fisherman nor Paul."

CANTO XIX.

Jtrgttmcnt.

The eagle speaks as with one voice proceeding 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 salvation without belief in Christ ; exposes the
inefficacy of a mere profession of such belief; and prophesies the evil
appearance that many Christian potentates will make at the day of
judgment.

Before my sight appeared, with open wings,

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

Befals me to pourtray, voice hath not utter'd,

Nor hath ink written,5 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

1 Taking the bread away.] " Excommunication, or interdiction of the
eucharist, is now employed as a weapon of warfare."

2 That writest but to cancel.] " And thou, Pope Boniface, who writest thy
ecclesiastical censures for no other purpose than to be paid for revoking
them."

3 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. Lombardi, I know not why,
would apply this to Clement V. rather than to Boniface VIII.

4 And for a dance.] I am indebted to an intelligent critic in the Monthly
Review, 1823, for pointing out my former erroneous translation of the words
" per salti," " From the wilds."

6 Nor hath ink written.] This joie ne maie not written be with inke.

Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, b. 3.
2D

418 THE VISION. 15—45.

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 : " 0 perennial flowers
Of gladness everlasting ! that exhale
In single breath your odours 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,
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 1 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 2 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 3
Of his omniscience should not still remain
In infinite excess. In proof whereof,
He first through pride supplanted, who was sum

1 Like to a falcon.'] Come falcon ch' uscisse dal cappello.

Boccaccio, II Filostrato, p. iv. st. 83.
Which Chaucer translates :

As fresh as faucon coming out of mew. Troilus and Creseide, b. 3.

Poi come fa '1 falcon, quando si move,

Cosl Umilta al cielo alzo la vista. Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. v.

Rinaldo sta come suole il falcone

Uscito del capello a la veleta. L. Pulci, Morgante Magg. c. xi.

2 ]Vho turn'd his compass.] " When he prepared the heavens, I was there:
when he set a compass upon the face of the depth." Proverbs, viii. 27.

In his hand

He took the golden compasses, prepared

In God's eternal store, to circumscribe

This universe, and all created things. Milton, P. L. b. 7. 227.

3 The Word.] "The divine nature still remained incomprehensible. Of
this Lucifer was a proof ; for he, though the chief of all created beings, yet,
through his pride, waiting not for further supplies of the divine illumination,
fell without coming to maturity." Thus our author in the De Vulgari Eloquio,
speaking of the fallen angels, says, "divinam curani perversi expectare
noluerunt." Lib. 1. cap. ii.

46—89. PARADISE, Canto XIX. 419

Of eacti 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,

5Tis 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

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 1 ' — 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,1 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.

" 0 animals of clay ! 0 spirits gross !
The primal will,2 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,

1 To him.'] "He, who should argue, on the words I have just used, re-
specting the fate of those who have wanted means of knowing the Gospel,
would certainly have cause enough to doubt, if he did not defer to the
authority of Scripture, which pronounces God to be thoroughly just."

- The primal will.] The divine will.

420 THE VISION. 90—121.

"Whiles they with upward eyes do look on her ;

So lifted I my gaze ; and, bending so,

The ever-blessed image waved its wings,

Labouring 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 splendours 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 blest limbs
Were nail'd upon the wood. But lo ! of those
Who call ' Christ, Christ,' 1 there shall be many found,
In judgment, further off from him by far,
Than such to whom his name was never known.
Christians like these the ^Ethiop 2 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,3 in the which
All their dispraise is written, spread to view ?
There amidst Albert's 4 works shall that be read,
Which will give speedy motion to the pen,
When Prague 5 shall mourn her desolated realm.
There shall be read the woe, that he fi 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.

1 Who call 'Christ, Christ.'] "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord,
Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven." Matt. vii. 21.

2 The jEthiop.] "The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this
generation, and shall condemn it." Matt. xii. 41.

3 That volume.'] " And I saw the dead, small 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. xx. 12.

4 Albert.] Purgatory, Canto vi. 98.

5 Prague.] The eagle predicts the devastation of Bohemia by Albert, which
happened soon after this time, when that emperor obtained the kingdom for
his eldest son Rodolph. See Coxe's House of Austria, 4to ed. vol. i. part i.
p. 87.

6 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.
This king died in consequence of his horse being thrown to the ground by a
wild boar, in 1314. The circumstances of his death are minutely related by
Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 4. cap. xix.

7 The English and Scot.] He adverts to the disputes between John Baliol

122—139. PARADISE, Canto XIX. 421

There shall he seen the Spaniard's luxury ; 1
The delicate living there of the Bohemian,2
Who still to worth has been a willing stranger.
The halter of Jerusalem 3 shall see
A unit for his virtue ; for his vices,
No less a mark than million. He,4 who guards
The isle of fire by old Anchises honour'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. All there shall know
His uncle 5 and his brother's 6 filthy doings,
Who so renown'd a nation and two crowns
Have bastardized.7 And they, of Portugal8
And Norway,9 there shall be exposed, with him
Of Ratza,10 who hath counterfeited ill
The coin of Venice. 0 blest Hungary ! u
If thou no longer patiently abidest

and Edward I., the latter of whom is commended in the Purgatory, Canto vii.
130.

1 The Spaniard's luxury.] The commentators refer this to Alonzo X. of
Spain. It seems probable that the allusion is to Ferdinand 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. See Mariana, Hist. lib. 15.
cap. xi.

2 The Bohemian.'] Winceslaus II., Purgatory, Canto vii. 99.

3 The halter of Jerusalem.] Charles II. of Naples and Jerusalem, who was
lame. See Note to Purgatory, Canto vii. 122, and xx. 78.

4 He.] Frederick of Sicily, son of Peter III. of Arragon. Purgatory, Canto
vii. 117. The isle of fire is Sicily, where was the tomb of Anchises.

5 His uncle.] James, king of Majorca and Minorca, brother to Peter III.

6 His brother.] James II. of Arragon, who died in 1327. See Purgatory,
Canto vii. 117.

7 Bastardized.] "Bozze," according to Bembo, is a Provencal word for
"bastardo e non legitimo." Delia Volg. Lingua, lib. 1. p. 25, ediz. 1544.
Others have understood it to mean, "one dishonoured by his wife."

8 Of Portugal.] In the time of Dante, Dionysius was king of Portugal.
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. See Mariana, lib. 15. cap. xviii.
Perhaps the rebellious son of Dionysius may be alluded to.

9 Norway.] Haqnin, king of Norway, is probably meant; who, having
given refuge to the murderers of Eric VII., king of Denmark, A.D. 1288, com-
menced a war against his successor, Eric VIII., "which continued for nine
years, almost to the utter ruin and destruction of both kingdoms." Modern
Univ. Hist. vol. xxxii. p. 215.

10 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. Regno degli Slavi, ediz. Pesaro, 1601.
Uladislaus appears to have been the sovereign in Dante's time : but the dis-
graceful forgery, adverted to in the text, is not recorded by the historian.

11 Hungary.] The kingdom of Hungary was about this time disputed by
Carobert, son of Charles Martel, and Winceslaus, prince of Bohemia, son of
Winceslaus II. See Coxe's House of Austria, vol. i. part i. p. 86, 4to edit.

422 THE VISION. 140—145.

Thy ill-entreating : and, O blest Navarre ! x

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,3 grudging at their beast,

Who keepeth even footing with the rest." 4

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.

When, 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.5
Of such vicissitude in heaven I thought ;
As the great sign,6 that marshaleth the world

1 Navarre.] Navarre was now under the yoke of France. It soon after (in
1328) followed the advice of Dante, and had a monarch of its own. Mariana,
lib. 15. cap. xix.

2 Mountainous girdle.] The Pyrenees.
3 Famagosta's streets

And Nicosia's.] Cities in the kingdom of Cyprus, at that time ruled by
Henry II., a pusillanimous prince. Vertot, Hist, des Chev. de Malte, lib. 3.
iv. The meaning appears to be, that the complaints made by those cities of
their weak and worthless governor, may be regarded as an earnest of his con-
demnation at the last doom.

4 The rest.] " Wise Poet ! " thus Landino concludes his commentary on this
Canto ; " to whom the human race owes obligations for having thus severely
reprehended the faults of princes ; since these are not, like the errors of
private persons, harmful to one or a few ouly ; but injure all the country
which they govern ; and a single one frequently causes the ruin of whole
nations." Much to the same effect is a memorable sentence in Xenophon's
Agesilaics, that excellent manual for princes : xct) rocs fib rZv IZiairaJy i^agr/af

x^ctxs l<fl$l, reef il rut a.£xovra>» (jL,iyu.\us *i?t, xqivuv, rous /JtXv oXiyoe., revf St xoXXk

x»xu( hotnOivxi. C. xi. 6. Compare also the opening of Demosthenes' second
Speech against Aristogiton.

5 Wherein one shines.] The light of the sun, whence he supposes the other
celestial bodies to derive their light. Thus, in the Convito, p. 115 : " Nullo
sensibile," etc. "No sensible object in the world is more worthy to be made
an example of the deity, than the sun, which with sensible light enlightens
first itself, and then all celestial and elementary bodies."

6 The great sign.] The eagle, the Imperial ensign.

9—49. PARADISE, Canto XX. 423

And the world's leaders, in the blessed beak
Was silent : for that all those living lights,
Waxing in splendour, 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.

After l the precious and bright beaming stones,
That did ingem the sixth light, ceased the chiming
Of their angelic bells ; methought I heard
The murmuring of a river, that doth fall
From rock to rock transpicuous, making known
The richness of his spring-head : and as sound
Of cittern, at the fret-board, or of pipe,
Is, at the wind-hole, 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 2 in me, that sees and bears the sun
In mortal eagles," it began, " must now
Be noted stedfastly : 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 3 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,4
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,5 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 6
Alter not, when, through pious prayer below,
To-day is made to-morrow's destiny.

1 After.] " After the spirits in the sixth planet (Jupiter) had ceased their
singing."

2 The part.] Lombardi well observes, that the head of the eagle is seen in
profile, so that one eye only appears.

3 Who.] David.

4 He.] Trajan. See Purgatory, Canto x. 68.
6 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.

424 THE VISION. 50—73.

The other following,1 with the laws and me,

To yield the shepherd room, pass'd o'er 2 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,3 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

That Trojan Ripheus,4 in this round, was set,

Fifth of the saintly splendours ? 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, stampt by the everlasting pleasure,

Which fashions, as they are, all things that be.

I, though my doubting were as manifest,
As is through glass 6 the hue that mantles it,

1 The other following .] Constantine. 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.

2 Pass'd o'er.] " Left the Roman state to the Pope, and transferred the seat
of the empire to Constantinople."

3 William.] William II., king of Sicily, at the latter part of the twelfth
century. He was of the Norman line of sovereigns, and obtained 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 presence of Charles II. of Anjou, and
Frederick of Arragon, was of sorrow and complaint.

4 Trojan Ripheus.]

Ripheus justissimus unus
Qui fuit in Teucris, et servantissimus sequi. Virg. jEn. lib. 2. 427.
Then Ripheus fell, the justest far of all
The sons of Troy. Pitt.

5 Through glass.] This is the only allusion I have remarked in our author
to the art of painting glass. Tiraboschi traces that invention in Italy as far
back as to the end of the eighth century. Stor. delta Lett. Ital. torn. iii. lib.
3. cap. vi. sec. ii. This, however, if we may trust Mr. Warton's judgment,
must have been a sort of mosaic in glass. For to express figures in glass, or
what we now call the art of painting in glass, that writer observes, "was a
very different work ; and I believe I can show it was brought from Con-
stantinople to Rome before the tenth century, with other ornamental arts."
History of English Poetry, vol. iii. p. 22. In the following passage from the
Dittamondo of Fazio degli Uberti, lib. 5. cap iii., the allusion is to mosaic in
glass.

E pensa s' ai veduto e posto cura,
Quando il musaico con vetri dipinti
Adorna e compon ben la sua pittura,

74—116. PARADISE, Canto XX. 425

In silence waited not ; for to my lips

"What things are these 1 " involuntary rush' J,

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 belie vest 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 conquered ; 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,1 of the feet in future to be pierced,
That,2 of feet nail'd already to the cross.
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 3 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 ;

E quei che son piu riccamente tinti
Nelle piu nobil parti gli son sempre,
Ed e converso nel men gli piu stinti.

1 This.] Ripheus.

2 That] Trajan.

3 The prayers.] The prayers of St. Gregory.

426 THE VISION. 117—140.

Wherein believing, he endured no more

The filth of Paganism, and for their ways

Rebuked the stubborn nations. The three nymphs,1

Whom at the right wheel thou beheld'st advancing,

Were sponsors for him, more than thousand years

Before baptizing. 0 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,
It doth remember me, that I beheld
The pair 2 of blessed luminaries move,
Like the accordant twinkling of two eyes,
Their beamy circlets, dancing to the sounds.

CANTO XXI.

^rgxtmntt.

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.

Again 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,

1 The three nymphs.] Faith, Hope, and Charity. Purgatory, Canto xxix.
116.

2 The pair. 1 Kipheus and Trajan.

9—47. PARADISE, Canto XXL 427

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 splendour l are we wafted,

That, underneath the burning lion's breast,2

Beams, in this hour, commingled with his might.

Thy mind be with thine eyes ; and, in them, mirror'd 3

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,4 poising either weight.

Within the crystal, which records the name
(As its remoter circle girds the world)
Of that loved monarch,5 in whose happy reign
No ill had power to harm, I saw rear'd up,
In colour like to sun-illumined gold,
A ladder, which my ken pursued in vain,
So lofty was the summit ; down whose steps
I saw the splendours 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,6 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.'"5

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 :
" I am not worthy, of my own desert,

1 The seventh splendour.'] The planet Saturn.

2 The burning lion's breast.] The constellation Leo.

3 In them, mirror'd.] "Let the form which thou shalt now behold in this
mirror," the planet, that is, of Saturn, (soon after, v. 22, called the crystal,)
" be reflected in the mirror of thy sight."

4 In equal balance.] " My pleasure was as great in complying with her
will, as in beholding her countenance."

8 Of that loved monarch.] Saturn. Compare Hell, Canto xiv. 91.

6 That glitterance.] Quello sfavillar. That multitude of shining spirits,
who, coming to a certain point of the ladder, made those different movements,
which he has described as made by the birds.

428 THE VISION. 48—92.

That thou shouldst answer me : but for her sake,

Who hath vouchsafed my asking, spirit blest,

That in thy joy art 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 *

Of Beatrice interrupts our song.

Only to yield thee gladness of my voice,

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,2 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, " 0 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 :
" Splendour 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, equaling with my blaze
The keenness of my sight. But not the soul,3
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
Is 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

1 What forbade the smile.] " Because it would have overcome thee."

2 There aloft.'] Where the other souls were.

3 Not the soul.] The particular ends of Providence being concealed from
the very angels themselves.

93—114. PARADISE, Canto XXI. 429

Admonisli'd, I the question urged no more ;

And of the spirit humbly sued alone

To instruct me of its state. " Twist either shore 1

Of Italy, nor distant from thy land,

A stony ridge 2 ariseth ; in such sort,

The thunder doth not lift his voice so high.

They call it Catria : 3 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 4 there was I y-clept :

Pietro the sinner, when before I dwelt,

Beside the Adriatic,5 in the house

1 ' Tioixt either shore.] Between the Adriatic gulf and the Mediterranean sea.

2 A stony ridge.] A part of the Apennine. Gibbo is literally a "hunch."
Thus Archilochus calls the island of Thasns, S»ov §<*.%n. See Gaisford's Poetce
Minores Grceci, t. i. p. 298.

3 Catria.] Now the abbey of Santa Croce, in the duchy of Urbino, about
half way between Gubbio and La Pergola. Here Dante is said to have resided
for some time. See the Life prefixed.

4 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, how-
ever, he preferred his former retreat in the monastery of Fonte Avellana,
and prevailed on Alexander II. to permit him to retire thither. Yet he did
not long continue 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." Tira-
boschi, Storia delta Lett. Ital. torn. iii. lib. 4. cap. ii. He is mentioned by
Petrarch, De Vita Solit. lib. 2. sec. iii. cap. xvii. : " Siquidem statum ilium,
pompasque sseculi suis contribulibus linquens, ipse Italise medio, ad sinis-
trum Apennini latus, quietissimam solitudinem, de qua multa conscripsit,
et quae vetus adhuc fontis Avellanae nomen servat, perituris honoribus pre-
ferendam duxit, ubi non minus gloriose postmodum latuit quam innotuerat
primum Romae, nee dedecori illi fuit alti verticis rutilum decus squalenti
cilicio permutasse." Petrarchae Opera, Basil, 1571, p. 266.

5 Beside the Adriatic.] Some editions and manuscripts have "fu," instead
of "fui." According to the former of these readings, S. Pietro Damiano is
made to distinguish himself from S. Pietro degli Onesti, surnamed " II 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. If it could be ascer-
tained that there was no religious house dedicated to the blessed Virgin, be-

430 THE VISION. 115—133.

Of our blest Lady. Near upon my close
Of mortal life, through much importuning
I was constraint to wear the hat,1 that still
From bad to worse is shifted. — Cephas 2 came ;
He came, who was the Holy Spirit's vessel ; 3
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 hoist them. Down the palfrey's sides
Spread their broad mantles, so as both the beasts
Are cover'd with one skin. 0 patience ! thou
That look'st on this, and dost endure so long."
I at those accents saw the splendours down
From step to step alight, and wheel, and wax,
Each circuiting, more beautiful. Round this 4
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.

QxQvtmtnt.

He beholds many other spirits of the. devout and contemplative ; and amongst
these is addressed by Saint 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 splendour, 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 past between his present station and the earth.

Astounded, to the guardian of my steps
I turn'd me, like the child, who always runs
Thither for succour, where he trusteth most :
And she was like the mother,5 who her son

fore that founded by Pietro degli Onesti, to which the other Pietro might
have belonged, this reading would, no doubt, be preferable ; but at present
it seems very uncertain which is the right.

1 The hat.] The cardinal's hat.

2 Cephas.] St. Peter.

3 The Holy Spirit's vessel.] St. Paul. See Hell, Canto ii. 30.

4 Round this.] Round the spirit of Pietro Damiano.

5 Like the mother.] Come la madre, che '1 figliuol ascolta

Dietro a se piangner, si volge, ed aspetta,
Poi il prende per mano e da la volta.

Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 3. cap. xxi.

5—37. PARADISE, Canto XXII. 431

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 x were already known to thee,

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 splendour. 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.

" If thou, like me, beheld'st the charity
That burns amongst us ; what thy mind conceives
Were utter'd. But that, ere the lofty 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 2 rests,
Was, on its height, frequented by a race 3

1 The vengeance.'] Beatrice, it is supposed, intimates the approaching
fate of Boniface VIII. See Purgatory, Canto xx. 86.

2 Cassino.] A castle in the Terra di Lavoro. "The learned Benedictine,
D. Angelo della Noce, in his notes on the chronicle of the monastery of Cassino,
(Not. cxi.) corrects the error of Cluverius and Eftenus, who describe Cassino
as situated in the same place where the monastery now is ; at the same time
commending the veracity of our author in this passage, which places Cassino
on the side of the mountain, and points out the monastery founded by Saint
Benedict on its summit." Lombardi.

3 Frequented by a race.] Lombardi here cites an apposite passage from the
writings of Pope Saint Gregory: "Mons tria millia," etc. Dialog, lib. 2.
cap. viii. " The mountain rising for the space of three miles stretches its top
towards the sky, where was a very ancient temple, in which, after the manner
of the old heathens, Apollo was worshiped by the foolish rustics. On every
side, groves had sprung up in honour of the false gods ; and in these, the mad
multitude of unbelievers still tended on their unhallowed sacrifices. There
then the man of God (Saint Benedict) arriving, beat in pieces the idols ;
overturned the altar ; cut down the groves : and, in the very temple of Apollo,

432 THE VISION. 38—69.

Deceived and ill-disposed : and I it was,1
"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 ; 2 Romoaldo 3 here ;
And here my brethren, who their steps refrain'd
Within the cloisters, and held firm their heart."

I answering thus : " Thy 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 favour, as to gaze
Upon thine image by no covering veil'd."

"Brother ! " he thus rejoin'd, "in the last sphere4
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.

built the shrine of Saint Martin, placing that of Saint John where the altar
of Apollo had stood ; and, by his continual preaching, called the multitude
that dwelt round about, to the true faith."

1 Iitxoas.] " A new order of monks, which in a manner absorbed all the
others that were established in the west, was instituted, A.D. 529, by Bene-
dict of Nursia, a man of piety and reputation for the age he lived in."
Maclaine's Mosheim, Eccles. Hist. vol. ii. cent. vi. p. ii. c. ii. sec. 6.

2 Macarius.'] There are two of this name enumerated by Mosheim among
the Greek theologians of the fourth century, vol. i. cent. iv. p. xi. chap. ii. sec. 9.
In the following chapter, sec. 10, it is said, "Macarius, an Egyptian monk, un-
doubtedly deserves the first rank among the practical writers of this time, as
his works displayed, some few things excepted, the brightest and most lovely
portraiture of sanctity and virtue."

3 Romoaldo.] S. Romoaldo, a native of Ravenna, and the founder of the
order of Camaldoli, died in 1027. He was the author of a commentary on the
Psalms.

4 In the last sphere.] The Empyrean, where he afterwards sees Saint
Benedict, Canto xxxii. 30. Beatified spirits, though they have different
heavens allotted them, have all their seat in that higher sphere.

70—110. PARADISE, Canto XXII. 433

Thither the patriarch Jacob l 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 choak'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

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 oft-times 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,2 that followeth Taurus, I beheld,
And enter'd its precinct. 0 glorious stars !
O light impregnate with exceeding virtue !
To whom whate'er of genius lifteth me

1 The 'patriarch Jacob.] " And he dreamed, and behold, a ladder set upon
the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven : and behold the angels of God
ascending and descending on it." Gen. xxviii. 12. So Milton, P. L. b. 3.
510:

The stairs were such, as whereon Jacob saw
Angels ascending and descending, bands
Of guardians bright.

2 The sign.] The constellation of Gemini.

2 E

434 THE VISION. 111—142.

Above the vulgar, grateful I refer ;

With ye the parent 1 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 2

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 emprize that draws me on.

" Thou art so near the sum of blessedness,"
Said Beatrice, " that behoves thy ken
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 3
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,4 whereof late I deem'd
That dense and rare were cause. Here 1 sustain'd
The visage, Hyperion, of thy son ;5
And niark'd, how near him with their circles, round
Move Maia and Dione ; 6 here discern'd
Jove's tempering 'twixt his sire and son ; 7 and hence,
Their changes and their various aspects,

1 The parent.] The sun was in the constellation of the Twins at the time of
Dante's birth.

2 The lofty wheel.'] The eighth heaven ; that of the fixed stars.

3 This globe.] So Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, b. 5. :

And down from thence fast he gan avise
This little spot of earth, that with the sea
Embraced is, and fully gan despise
This wretched world.

All the world as to mine eye

No more seemed than a prike. Temple of Fame, b. 2.

Compare Cicero, Somn. Scip. : " Jam ipsa terra ita mihi parva visa est," etc. ;
Lucan, Phars. lib. 9. xi. ; and Tasso, G. L. c. xiv. st. 9, 10, 11.

4 Without the shadow.] See Canto ii. 71.

5 Of thy son.] The sun.

6 Maia and Dione.] The planets Mercury and Venus: Dione being the
mother of the latter, and Maia of the former deity.

7 'Twixt his sire and son.] Betwixt Saturn and Mars.

143—150 PARADISE, Canto XXIII. 435

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.

CANTO XXIII.

QrQnmtnt

He sees Christ triumphing with his church. The Saviour ascends, followed by
his virgin Mother. The others remain with Saint Peter.

E'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,1 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 2 smiles,
In peerless beauty, 'mid the eternal nymphs,3

1 That region.] Towards the south, where the course of the sun appears less
rapid, than when he is in the east or the west.
■ Trivia.] A name of Diana.
3 The eternal nymphs.] The stars.

436 THE VISION. 27—61.

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.

0 Beatrice ! sweet and precious guide,
Who cheer'd me with her comfortable words :
" Against the virtue, that o'erpowereth thee,
Avails not to resist. Here is the Might,1
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."

1 was as one, when a forgotten dream 2
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

1i>A\0L Tt XXT Ci'ldiea.,

Aa/j.Ta.'h' , tt uxvSoxi vvf/.<pot,i

'irirt6eu<rt hf otftetixs. Eurip. Supp. 995, edit. Barnes.
Those starry nymphs, which dance about the pole. Drummond, Sonnet.
Musgrave and Herman would dismiss the word wpipeti, "nymphs," from this
passage in Euripides ; but the use of it by our Author in the text, tends to
prove that it is the genuine reading : and it is thus that poets of the most
distant ages, and without any knowledge of each other's writings, (for we can
scarcely imagine Dante to have read the plays of Euripides,) may often protect
one another against the verbal critics. Drummond, I believe, had learning
enough to be indebted to either of his predecessors. Expressions somewhat
similar, in Theocritus and Tibullus, are observed by Markland.

1 The Might.} Our Saviour.

2 A forgotten dream.'] You might as well

Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream.

Wordsworth, Hart-Leap Well.

62—99. PARADISE, Canto XXIII. 437

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,1
Wherein the Word Divine was made incarnate ;
And here the lilies,2 by whose odour known
The way of life was follow'd." Prompt I heard
Her bidding, and encounter'd once again
The strife of aching vision. As, ere while,
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 splendours, on whom burning rays
Shed lightnings from above ; yet saw I not
The fountain whence they flowM. 0 gracious virtue
Thou, whose broad stamp is on them, higher up
, Thou didst exalt thy glory,3 to give room
To my o'erlabour'd sight ; when at the name
Of that fair flower,4 whom duly I invoke
Both morn and eve, my soul with all her might
Collected, on the goodliest ardour fix'd.
And, as the bright dimensions of the star
In heaven excelling, as once here on earth,
Were, in my eye-balls livelily pourtray'd ;
Lo ! from within the sky a cresset 5 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,6
Wherewith the goodliest sapphire,7 that inlays

1 The rose.] The Virgin Mary, who, says Lombardi, is termed by the church,
Rosa Mystica. "I was exalted like a palm-tree in Engaddi, and as a rose-
plant in Jericho. " Ecclesiasticus, xxiv. 14.

2 The lilies.] The Apostles. " And give ye a sweet savour as frankincense,
and nourish as a lily." Ecclesiasticus, xxxix. 14.

3 Thou didst exalt thy glory.] The divine light retired upwards, to render the
eyes of Dante more capable of enduring the spectacle which now presented itself.

4 The name

Of that fair flower.] The name of the Virgin.
5 A cresset] The angel Gabriel.

8 That lyre.] By synecdoche, the lyre is put for the angel.
7 The goodliest sapphire. ] The Virgin.

438 THE VISION. 100—134.

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."

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,1 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,2
That towering rose, and sought the seed 3 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 " 4 sang
So sweetly, the delight hath left me never.

Oh ! what o'erflowing plenty is up-piled
In those rich-laden coffers,5 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 ° 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 7 his mighty triumph holds,
To whom the keys of glory were assign'd.

1 The robe.] The ninth heaven, the primura mobile, that enfolds and moves
the eight lower heavens.

2 The crowned .flame.] The Virgin with the angel hovering over her.

3 The seed.] Our Saviour.

4 Regina Coeli.] "The beginning of an anthem, sung by the church at
Easter, in honour of our Lady." Vol pi.

5 Those rich-laden coffers.] Those spirits, who, having sown the seed of
good works on earth, now contain the fruit of their pious endeavours.

6 In the Babylonian exile.] During their abode in this world.

1 He.] St. Peter, with the other holy men of the Old and New Testament.

1—19. PARADISE, Canto XXIV. 439

CANTO XXIV.

Saint Peter examines Dante touching Faith, and is contented with his

answers.

" O 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 splendour : 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 2 of their joy.

1 Their carols.'] Carole. The annotator on the Monte Casino MS. observes,
"carolae dicuntur tripudium quoddam quod fit saliendo, ut Napolitani faciunt
et dicunt." The word had also that signification, which is now the only one
that common use attaches to it. " Au tiers jour il s'en partit," (the king of
Cyprus coming from Canterbury to Edward III.,) "et chevaucha le chemin de
Londres ; et fit tant qu'il vint a Altem ; ou le roi se tenoit, et grand foison de
Seigneurs appareilles pour le recevoir. Ce fut un dimenche a heure de relevee
qu'il vint la. Si eut entre celle heure et le souper grans danses et grans
karolles. La etoit le jeune Seigneur de Coucy qui s'efforcoit de hien danser et
de bien chanter quand son tour venoit," etc. Froissart, vol. i. cap. 219, fol.
edit. 1559.

These folke, of which I tell you so,
Upon a karole werten tho :
A ladie karoled hem, that hight
Gladnesse, hlissfull, and light,
Well could she sing and lustely.

Chaucer, Romaunt of the Rose, edit. 1602, fol. 112.

I saw her daunce so comely,
Carol and sing so sweetly.
Chaucer, The Dreame, or Booke of the Duchesse, fol. 231.

2 The riches.] Lombardi here reads with the Nidobeatina edition, "dalla
richezza," instead of "della ricchezza," and construes it of the amplitude of
the circles, according to which the Poet estimated their greater or less degree
of velocity. I have followed the other commentators.

440 THE VISION. 20—50.

From that,1 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
Eecords 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 colours fine enough to trace such folds.2

" 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 towards my lady breathed
From that blest ardour, soon as it was stay'd ;
To whom she thus : "0 everlasting light
Of him, within whose mighty grasp our Lord
Did leave the keys, which of this wondrous bliss
He bare below ! tent 3 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 stedfast, 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,4 and not to end it ;
So I, in silence, arm'd me, while she spake,

1 From that.] Saint Peter.

2 Such folds.] Pindar has the same hold image :

vu.vcuv frTV%*is. 0. 1. 170.

which both the Scholiast and Heyne, I think erroneously, understand of the
return of the strophes. Since this Note was written, I have found the same
interpretation of Pindar's expression as that I had adopted, in the manuscript
notes on that poet collected by Mr. St. Amand, and preserved in the Bodleian
Library, No. 42: "Notandum: maximum decus vestimenti antiquitus sinus
existimabantur, ita ut vix unquam a poetis tarn Grsecis quam Latinis vestis
pulchra describatur sine hoc adjuncto."

3 Tent.] Tenta. The word "tent," try, is used by our old writers, who, I
think, usually spell it " taint ; " as Massinger, Parliament of Love, act iv. sc. 3 :
" Do not fear, I have a staff to taint, and bravely."

4 To approve.] "Per approbarla." Landino has "aiutarla." "The
bachelor, or disputant in the school, arms or prepares himself to discuss the
question proposed by the master, whose business it is to terminate it." Such
is Vellutello's interpretation ; and it has the merit of being, at least, more
intelligible than Lombardi's, who, without reason, accuses the other com-
mentators, except Venturi, (whose explanation he rejects,) of passing over the
difficulty.

51—87. PARADISE, Canto XXIV. 441

Summoning up each argument to aid ;

As was behoveful for such questioner,

And such profession : " As good Christian ought,

Declare thee, what is faith 1 " 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 1

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 J 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.
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 :
" If 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 2 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,
" I not a whit misdoubt of its assay."

Next issued 3 from the deep-imbosoni'd splendour :

1 Faith.] Hebrews, xi. 1. So Marino, in one of his sonnets, which he calls
Divozioni :

Fecle e snstanza di sperate cose,
E delle non visibili argomento.

2 Current.'] " The answer thou hast made, is right : but let me know if thy
inward persuasion be conformable to thy profession."

3 Next issued.] " We find that the more men have been acquainted with the
practice of Christianity, the greater evidence they have had of the truth of it,
and been more fully and rationally persuaded of it. To such I grant there are
such powerful evidences of the truth of the doctrine of Christ by the effectual
workings of the Spirit of God upon their souls, that all other arguments, as to
their own satisfaction, may fall short of these. As to which, those verses of
the poet Dantes, rendered into Latin by F. S., are very pertinent and signifi-

442 THE VISION. 88—104.

"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
Eain'd down upon the ancient bond and new,1 —
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
I answer'd : " Nature did not make for these
The iron hot, or on her anvil mold them."

" Who vouch eth 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," 2 said I, " should have been turn'd

cant ; for when he had introduced the Apostle Peter, asking him what it was
which his faith was founded on, he answers,

Deinde exivit ex luce profunda

Qua? illic splendebat pretiosa gemma,

Super quam omnis virtus fundatur.

i.e. That God was pleased by immediate revelation of himself, to discover that
divine truth to the world whereon our faith doth stand as on its sure founda-
tion ; but when the Apostle goes on to enquire how he knew this at first came
from God, his answer to that is,

larga pluvia

Spiritus Sancti, quae est diffusa

Super veteres et super novas membranas

Est syllogismus ille qui earn mihi conclusit

Adeo acute, ut pne ilia demonstratione

Omnis demonstratio alia mihi videatur obtusa.

i.e. That the Spirit of God doth so fully discover itself both in the Old and New
Testament, that all other arguments are but dull and heavy if compared with
this." Stillingfleet, Or. Sa. b. 2. chap. ix. sec. xix. § 4. The reader will per-
ceive that our learned divine has made an error in his quotation of this passage.

1 The ancient bond and new. The Old and New Testament.

2 That all the world.] "We cannot conceive how the world should be at
first induced to believe without manifest and uncontrouled miracles. For as
Chrysostom speaks, tl <rr)fx.i!u» x^i'* ?«■*"«», *o\>ci ,ue7?«» to 6<iv/*et. <pa/W«/. It was
the greatest miracle of all, if the world shou'd believe without miracles.
Which the Poet Dantes hath well expressed in the twenty-fourth Canto of
Paradise. For when the Apostle is there brought in. asking the Poet upon
what account he took the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be the
word of God ; his answer is,

Probatio quae verum hoc mihi recludit,

Sunt opera, quae secuta sunt, ad quae Natura

Non candefecit ferrum unquam aut percussit incudem.

i.e. The evidence of that is the Divine Power of miracles which was in those
who deliver'd those things to the world. And when the Apostle catechiseth
him further, how he knew those miracles were such as they pretended to be,
viz. that they were true and divine ; his answer is,

105—129. PARADISE, Canto XXIV. 443

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.
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 past them, I commend.
Behoves thee to express, what thou believest,
The next ; and, whereon, thy belief hath grown."

" 0 saintly sire and spirit ! " I began,
" Who seest that, which thou didst so believe,
As to outstrip 2 feet younger than thine own,
Toward the sepulchre ; thy will is here,
That I the tenour 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

Si orbis terrae sese convertit ad Christianismum
Inquiebam ego, sine miraculis ; hoc unum
Est tale, ut reliqua non sint ejus centesima pars.
i.e. If the world shou'd be converted to the Christian faith without miracles,
this would be so great a miracle, that others were not to be compared with it.
I conclude this, then, with that known saying of St. Austin, Quisquis adhuc
prodigia, ut credat, inquiret, magnum est ipse prodigium qui mundo credente
non credit : He that seeks for miracles still to induce him to faith, when the
world is converted to the Christian faith, he needs not seek for prodigies
abroad ; he wants only a looking-glass to discover one. For, as he goes on,
Unde temporibus eruditis, et orane quod fieri non potest respuentibus, sine
ullis miraculis nimium mirabiliter incredibilia credidit muudus? Whence
came it to pass that in so learned and wary an age as that was which the
Apostles preach'd in, the world without miracles should be brought to believe
things so strangely incredible as those were which Christ and his Apostles
preach'd." Stillingfieet, Or. Sa. b. 2. chap. x. sec. v. § 1. Donne, in his
Sermons, (vol. ii. p. 215, fol. edit.,) quotes a similar passage from Augustine,
and applies it to the demand for miracles, made by Roman Catholics on
Protestants.

1 That Worthy.'] Quel Baron. In the next Canto, St. James is called
"Barone." So in Boccaccio, G. vi. N. 10, we find "Baron Messer Santo
Antonio."

2 As to outstrip.] Venturi insists that the Poet has here " made a slip ;"
for that John came first to the sepulchre, though Peter was the first to enter
it. But let Dante have leave to explain his own meaning, in a passage from
his third book De Monarchid : " Dicit etiam Johannes ipsum (scilicit Petrum)
introiisse subito, enm venit in monumentum, videns alium discipulum cunctan-
tem ad ostium." P. 146.

444 THE VISION. 130—151.

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.

CANTO XXV.

QxQmntnt

Saint James questions our Poet concerning Hope. Next Saint John appears ;
and, on perceiving that Dante looks intently on him, informs him that
he, Saint 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.

If e'er the sacred poem, that hath made

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,1 where, a sleeping lamb, •

The wolves set on and fain had worried me ;

Witli 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,2

Peter had then circled my forehead thus.

1 The fair sheep-fold.'] Florence, whence he was banished.

2 For Us sake.] For the sake of that faith.

15—31. PARADISE, Canto XXV. 445

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." 1

As when the ring-dove by his mate alights ;
In circles, each about the other wheels,
And, murmuring, cooes his fondness : thus saw I
One, of the other 2 great and glorious prince,
With kindly greeting, hail'd ; extolling, both,
Their heavenly banqueting : but when an end
Was to their gratulation, silent, each,
Before me sat they down, so burning bright,
I could not look upon them. Smiling then,
Beatrice spake : "0 life in glory shrined !
Who 3 didst the largess 4 of our kingly court

1 Galicia throng'd with visitants.] See Mariana, Hist. lib. 11. cap. xiii. : " En
el tiempo," etc. " 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 visit it. Many others were deterred by the difficulty of the
journey, by the roughness and barrenness of those parts, and by the incursions
of the Moors, who made captives many of the pilgrims. — The canons of St-
Eloy, afterwards, (the precise time is not known,) with a desire of remedying
these evils, built, in many places, along the whole road, which reached as far
as to France, hospitals for the reception of the pilgrims." In the Convito, p.
74, we find " la galassia," etc. " the galaxy, that is, the white circle which the
common people call the way of St. James ; " on which Biscioni remarks : "The
common people formerly considered the milky way as a sign by night to
pilgrims, who were going to St. James of Galicia ; and this perhaps arose from
the resemblance of the word galaxy to Galicia. I have often," he adds, "heard
women and peasants call it the Eoman road," "la strada di Roma."

Lo there (quod he) cast up thine eye,

Se yondir, lo ! the Galaxie,

The whiche men clepe the milky way,

For it is white, and some perfay,

Ycallin it han Watlynge Strete. Chaucer, The Souse of Fame, b. 2.

2 One, of the other.'] Saint Peter and Saint James.

3 Who.] The Epistle of St. James is here attributed to the elder apostle of
that name, whose shrine was at Compostella, in Galicia. Which of the two
was the author of it, is yet doubtful. The learned and candid Michaelis con-
tends very forcibly for its having been written by James the Elder. Lardner
rejects that opinion as absurd : while Benson argues against it, but is well
answered by Michaelis, who, after all, is obliged to leave the question
undecided. See his Introduction to the New Testament, translated by Dr.
Marsh, ed. Cambridge, 1793, vol. iv. cap. xxvi. sees. 1, 2, 3. Mr. Home supposes,
that as the elder James " was put to death by Herod Agrippa, A.D. 44, (Acts,
xii. ) it is evident that he was not the author of the epistle which bears the
name of James, because it contains passages which refer to a later period, viz.
v. 1-8, which intimates the then immediately approaching destruction of

'Jerusalem, and the subversion of the Jewish polity." Introduction to the
Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, ed. 1818, vol. ii. p. 600.

4 Largess.] He appears to allude to the Epistle of James, chap. i. ver. 5 :

446 THE VISION. 32—62.

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,1
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 2
Assured me ; and mine eyes I lifted up 3
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 mayest therewith
Thyself, and all who hear, invigorate
With hope, that leads to blissful end ; declare,
What is that ho])e 1 how it doth flourish in thee 1
And whence thou hadst it 1 " 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
Kecorded 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,4 to see.
The other points, both which 5 thou hast inquired,
Not for more knowledge, but that he may tell
How dear thou hold'st the virtue ; these to him

" If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men
liberally, and upbraideth not ; and it shall be given him." Or, to ver. 17 :
"Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from
the Father of lights." Some editions, however, read " l'allegrezza," "joy," in-
stead of " la larghezza."

1 As oft.] Landino and Venturi, who read "Quanto," explain this, that
the frequency with which James had commended the virtue of hope, was in
proportion to the brightness in which Jesus had appeared at his transfiguration.
Vellutello, who reads " Quante," supposes that James three times recommends
patient hope in the last chapter of his Epistle ; and that Jesus, as many times,
showed his brightness to the three disciples ; once when he cleansed the lepers
(Luke, v.) ; again when he raised the daughter of Jairus (Mark, v.) ; and a
third time when he was transfigured. As to Lombardi, who also reads
11 Quante," his construction of the passage seems to me scarcely intelligible.

2 The second flame.] St. James.

3 I lifted up.] "I looked up to the Apostles." "I will lift up mine eyes
unto the hills, from whence cometh my help." Psalm cxxi. 1.

4 From Egypt to Jerusalem.] From the lower world to heaven.

5 Both which.] One point Beatrice has herself answered ; "how that hope
flourishes in him." The other two remain for Dante to resolve.

63—99. PARADISE, Canto XXV. 447

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," 1 said I,
" Is 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,2 ' 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." Whileas I spake,
A lamping, as of quick and volley'd lightning,
"Within the bosom of that mighty sheen 3
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 4 saith,
* That, in their own land, each one must be clad
In two-fold vesture ;' and their proper land
Is this delicious life. In terms more full,
And clearer far, thy brother 5 hath set forth
This revelation to us, where he tells
Of the white raiment destined to the saints."
And, as the words wer<: ending, from above,
"They hope in thee ! " first heard we cried : whereto
Answer'd the carols all. Amidst them next,

1 Hope.] This is from the Sentences of Petrus Lombardus : " Est autera
spes virtus, qua spiritualia et seterna bona sperautur, id est cum fiducia ex-
pectantur. Est enim spes certa expectatio futurse beatitudinis, veniens ex Dei
gratia et ex meritis prsecedentibus vel ipsam spem, quam natura prseit charitas
ut rem speratam, id est beatitudinem seternam. Sine meritis enim aliquid
sperare non spes, sed prsesumptio dici potest." Pet. Lomb. Sent. lib. 3. dist.
26, ed. Bas. I486, fol.

2 His anthem.] "They that know thy name will put their trust in thee."
Psalm ix. 10.

3 That mighty sheen.] The spirit of Saint James.

4 Isaias.] "He hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath
covered me with the robe of righteousness." Chap. lxi. 10.

5 Thy brother.] St. John in the Revelation, vii. 9.

448 THE VISION. 100—127.

A light of so clear amplitude emerged,
That winter's month x were but a single day,
Were such a crystal in the Cancer's sign.
Like as a virgin 2 riseth up, and goes,
And enters on the mazes of the dance ;
Though gay, yet innocent of worse intent,
Than to do fitting honour 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 3 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 nought 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 ; soI4(
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 5 that have ascended,

1 Winter's month.'] " If a luminary, like that which now appeared, were to
shine throughout the month following the winter solstice, during which the
constellation Cancer appears in the east at the setting of the sun, there would
be no interruption to the light, but the whole month would be as a single day."

2 Like as a virgin.] There is a pretty counterpart to this simile in the
Quadriregio of Frezzi :

Poi come donna, che fa reverenza
Lassando il hallo, tal' atto fe ella. Lib. 4. cap. v.
Then as a lady, when she leaves the dance,
Maketh obeisance, even so did she.
The same writer has another more like that in the text :
Come donzella, c'ha a guidar la danza,

Che a chi l'invita reverenzia face,

E po' incomincia vergognosa e manza,
Cosi colei, etc. Lib. 4. cap. ii.

3 This.] St. John, who reclined on the bosom of our Saviour, and to whose
charge Jesus recommended his mother.

4 So I.] He looked so earnestly, to descry whether St. John were present
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
thee ? "

5 The two.] Christ and Mary, whom he has described in the last Canto but
one, as rising above his sight.

128-139. PARADISE, Canto XXVI. 449

In this our blessed cloister, shine alone
With the two garments. So report below."

As when, for ease of labour, or to shun
Suspected peril, at a whistle's breath,
The oars, ere while dasli'd frequent in the wave,
All rest : the flamy circle at that voice
So rested ; and the mingling sound was still,
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.

Jtrgttttttttt.

Saint John examines our Poet touching Charity. Afterwards Adam tells
when he was created, and placed in the terrestrial Paradise ; 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.

With dazzled eyes, whilst wondering I remain'd ;

Forth of the beamy flame,1 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'erpowerYl 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." 2 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 is, 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 :

1 The beamy flame.'] St. John.

2 Ananias' hand.] Who, by putting his hand on St. Paul, restored his
sight. Acts, ix. 17.

2f

450 THE VISION. 23—61.

" Behoves thee sift more narrowly thy terms ;
And say, who level'd at this scope thy bow."

"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 nought 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,1 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 2 all my good before thee pass : '
Lastly, from thee I learn, who chief proclaim'st,
E'en at the outset 3 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 towards 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 4
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.
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.

1 From him.] Some suppose that Plato is here meant, who, in his Banquet,
makes Phaedrus say : lyt.o\tyura!.i o"Epus Iv t«7? *ii<r(ZvTa.Tois iTvxi, r^tirlSvrxros i\ m,
ftiyitrrw otyoiOuiti fiftiv Kinos l/rnv. " Love is confessedly amongst the eldest of
beings ; and being the eldest, is the cause to us of the greatest goods." Plat.
Op. torn. x. p. 177, Bip. ed. Others have understood it of Aristotle ; and
others, of the writer who goes by the name of Dionysius the Areopagite,
referred to in the twenty -eighth Canto.

2 I will make.'] Exodus, xxxiii. 19.

3 At the outset.] John, i. 1, etc.

4 The eagle of our Lord.] St. John.

62—99. PARADISE, Canto XXVI. 451

As for the leaves,1 that in the garden bloom,
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 mine 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,2
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 : " 0 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 3 of his furry coat,
The fondness, that stirs in him, and conforms
His outside seeming to the cheer within :

1 The leaves. ] Created beings.

2 The first living soul.'] Adam.

8 Covering.] Lombardi's explanation of this passage is somewhat ludicrous.
By " un animal coverto," he understands, not an animal in its natural cover-
ing of fur or hair, but one drest up with clothes, as a dog, for instance, "so
clad for sport ;" "un cane per trastullo coperto." Chaucer describes, as one
of the tokens of pleasure in a dog, " the smoothing down of his hairs :"

It came and crept to me as low,

Right as it had me yknow,

Held down his head, and joyned his cares,

And laid all smooth downe his heares.
The Dreame of Chaucer, or Book of the Duchesse, ed. 1G02, fol. 229.

452 THE VISION. 100—129.

And in like guise was Adam's spirit moved
To joyous mood, that through the covering shone,
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 x unto all things, and nought 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 2 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 3 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 language 4 I did use

Was worn away, or ever Nimrod's race

Their unaccomplishable work began.

For nought,5 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,

1 Parhelion.'] Who enlightens and comprehends all things ; but is himself
enlightened and comprehended by none.

2 Not that I tasted.] So Frezzi :

per colpa fu 1' uom messo in bando,

Non solameute per gustar del porno ;
Ma perch' e' trapasso di Dio il comando.

II Quadrir. lib. 4. cap. i.

3 Whence.] That is, from Limbo. See Hell, Canto ii. 53. Adam says that
5232 years elapsed from his creation to the time of his deliverance, which
followed the death of Christ.

4 The language.] Hac forma locutionis locutus est Adam, hac forma locuti
sunt omnes posteri ejus usque ad rcdincationem turris Babel. De Vidy. Eloq.
lib. 1. cap. vi. " This form of speech Adam used ; this, all his posterity until
the building of the tower of Babel."

5 For nought.] There is a similar passage in the De Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1. cap.
ix. "Since, therefore, all our language, except that which was created
together with the first man by God, has been repaired according to our own
will and pleasure, after that confusion, which was nothing else than a forget-
fulness of the former ; and since man is a being most unstable and variable,
our language can neither be lasting nor continuous ; but, like other things
which belong to us, as customs and dress, must be varied by distances of
places and times."

130—141. PAKADISE, Canto XXVII. 453

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,
El1 was the name on earth of the Chief Cood,
"Whose joy enfolds me : Eli then 'twas call'd.
And so beseemeth : for, in mortals, use 2
Is as the leaf upon the bough : that goes,
And other comes instead. Upon the mount
Most high above the waters, all my life,3
Both innocent and guilty, did but reach
From the first hour, to that which cometh next
(As the sun changes quarter) to the sixth."

CANTO XXVII.

QxQxtmtnt

Saint Peter bitterly rebukes the covetousness of his successors in the apostolic
see, while all the heavenly host sympathize in his indignation : they then
vanish upwards. Beatrice bids Dante again cast his view below. After-
wards 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.

Then " 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 4 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 5 lit :

1 EL] Some read Un, "One," instead of El: but the latter of these
readings is confirmed by a passage from Dante's Treatise Be Vulg. Eloq. lib. 1.
cap. iv. : "Quod prius vox primi loquentis sonaverit, viro same mentis in
promptu esse non dubito ipsum fuisse quod Deus est, videlicet El." St.
Isidore in the OHgines, lib. 7. cap. i., had said, " Primum apud Hebroeos Dei
nomen El dicitur."

2 Use.] From Horace, Ars Poet. 62.

3 All my life.] "I remained in the terrestrial Paradise only to the seventh
hour." In the Ilistoria Scolastica of Petrus Comestor, it is said of our first
parents: "Quidam tradunt eos fuisse in Paradiso septem horas." F. 9. ed.
Par. 1513, 4to.

4 One universal smile.]

Ivi ogni cosa intorno m'assembrava
Un' allegrezza di giocondo riso.

Frezzi, II Qiiadrir. lib. 4. cap. ii.
all things smiled. Milton, P. L. b. 8. 265.

5 Four torches.] St. Peter, St. James, St. John, and Adam.

454 THE VISION. 11—47.

And that,1 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 blest 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 2 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 colour,3 as the sun,

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 suffered. 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,4 fed ;

That she might serve for purchase of base gold :

But for the purchase of this happy life,

Did Sextus, Pius, and Callixtus bleed,

And Urban ; 5 they, whose doom was not without

Much weeping seal'd. No purpose was of ours,c

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

1 That.] St. Peter, who looked as the planet Jupiter would, if it assumed
the sanguine appearance of Mars.

2 He.) Boniface VIII.

3 Such colour.] Qui color infectis adversi solis ab ictu

Nubibus esse solet ; aut purpurea? Aurora?.

Ovid, Met. lib. 3. 184.

4 Of Linus, and of Cletus.] Bishops of Eome in the first century.

5 Did Sextus, Pius, and Callixtus bleed,

And Urban.] The former two, bishops of the same see, in the second ;
and 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 a mark to authorise iniquitous grants
a»d privileges."

48—80. PARADISE, Canto XXVII. 455

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 1 below

Range wide o'er all the pastures. Arm of God !

Why longer sleep'st thou ? Cahorsines and Gascons 2

Prepare to quaff our blood. 0 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 succour : and thou, son,3

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 vapours streams ad own the air,

What time the she-goat 4 with her skiey horn

Touches the sun ; so saw I there stream wide

The vapours, 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 compast." From the hour 6

When I before had cast my view beneath,

All the first region overpast I saw,

Which from the midmost to the boundary winds ;

That onward, thence, from Gades,G I beheld

The unwise passage of Laertes' son ;

And hitherward the shore,7 where thou, Europa,

Madest thee a joyful burden ; and yet more

Of this dim spot had seen, but that the sun,8

1 Wolves.'] Wolves shall succeed to teachers, grievous wolves.

Milton, P. L. b. 12. 508.

2 Cahorsines and Gascons.'] He alludes 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, of
whom see Hell, Canto xix. 86, and Note.

3 Thou, son.] Beatrus Petrus— multaque locutus est, et docuitme de veteri
testamento, de hominibus ctiam adhuc in seculo adhuc viventibus phcra peccata
intonuit mihi, precepitque, ut ea quae de illis audieram eis referrem. Alberici
Visio, sec. 45.

4 The she-goat.] When the sun is in Capricorn.

5 From the hour.] Since he had last looked (see Canto xxii.) he perceived
that he had past from the meridian circle to the eastern horizon ; the half of
our hemisphere, and a quarter of the heaven.

6 From Gades.] See Hell, Canto xxvi. 106.

7 The shore.] Phoenicia, where Europa, the daughter of Agenor, mounted on
the back of Jupiter, in his shape of a hull.

8 The sun.] Dante was in the constellation of Gemini, and the sun in Aries.

456 THE VISION. 81—116.

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 ardour 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. Its boon influence
From the fair nest of Leda 1 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 2 are plunged, thou seest :
Look elsewhere for the leaves. 0 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

There was, therefore, part of those two constellations, and the whole of
Taurus, between them.

1 The fair nest of Leda.] "From the Gemini ;" thus called, because Leda
was the mother of the twins, Castor and Pollux.

2 Time's roots.] "Here," says Beatrice, "are the roots, from whence time
springs : for the parts, into which it is divided, the other heavens must be con-
sidered." And she then breaks out into an exclamation on the degeneracy of
human nature, which does not lift itself to the contemplation of divine things.
Thus in the Quadriregio, lib. 2. cap. vi. :

11 tempo, e'l ciel, die sopra noi e volto,

fc una cosa, e non voltando il cielo,

Cio che da tempo pende saria tolto.
Time, and the heaven that turneth o'er our heads,
Are but as one ; and if the heaven turn'd not,
That, which depends on time, were done away.

117—138. PARADISE, Canto XXVIII. 457

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, than he doth wish her in her grave.

So suddenly doth the fair child of him,1

Whose welcome is the morn and eve his parting,

To negro blackness change her virgin white.

" Thou, to abate thy wonder, note, that none 2
Bears rule in earth ; and its frail family
Are therefore wanderers. Yet before the date,3
When, through the hundredth in his reckoning dropt,
Pale January must be shoved aside
From winter's calendar, these heavenly spheres
Shall roar so loud, that fortune shall be fain 4
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.

Still in the ninth heaven, our Poet is permitted to behold the divine essence ;
and then sees, in three hierarchies, the nine choirs of angels. Beatrice
clears some difficulties which occur to him on this occasion.

So she, who doth imparadise my soul,

Had drawn the veil from off our present life,

1 The fair child of him.] There is something very similar in our author's
treatise Be Monarchid, lib. i. p. 104 : " Hunianum genus filius est cceli quod
est perfectissimum in omni opere suo. Generat enim homo hominem et sol
juxta secundum in Naturali Auditu." This, therefore, is intended for a philo-
sophical truth, and not for a figure, as when Pindar calls "the day" "child
of the sun : "

'A,w£fasv
■ trxTd' 'AXiev. 01. ii. 59.

2 None.] Because, as has been before said, the shepherds are become wolves.

3 Before the date.] "Before many ages are past; before those fractions,
which are dropt in the reckoning of every year, shall amount to so large a
portion of time, that January shall be no more a winter month." By this
periphrasis is meant "in a short time ;" as we say familiarly, such a thing
will happen before a thousand years are over, when we mean, it will happen
soon. Thus Petrarch : —

Ben sa ch' il prova, e fiati cosa piana

Anzi mill' anni. Trionfo d'Amore, cap. i.

4 Fortune shall be fain.] The commentators, in general, suppose that our

458 THE VISION. 3—40.

And beared 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 befal 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 l 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 vapour spreads ;

There wheel'd about the point a circle of fire,

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.2 .

The circle thereto most conjoin'd observe ;

And know, that by intenser love its course

Poet here augurs that great reform, which he vainly hoped would follow on the
arrival of the Emperor Henry VII. in Italy. Lombardi refers the prognosti-
cation to Can Grande della Scala : and when we consider that this Canto waa
not finished till after the death of Henry, as appears from the mention that is
made of John XXII., it cannot be denied but the conjecture is probable
Troya (Veltro Allegorico, p. 186) suggests Matteo Visconti, or Castruccio
Castracani, as the expected reformer.

1 That volume.] The ninth heaven ; as Vellutello, I think, rightly
interprets it.

2 Heaven, and all nature, hangs upon that point.] I* roi»Crit; £§<* *$x*>< »?;t»jt«/
o ovcavo; xou i ifCa-ts. Aristot. Metaph. lib. 12. c. vii. " From that beginning
depend heaven and nature."

41—72. PARADISE, Canto XXVIII. 459

Is, to this swiftness, wing'd." To whom I thus :
" It 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."

" It 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
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 2 blows from his milder cheek

1 Such difference.] The material world and the intelligential (the copy and
the pattern) appear to Dante to differ in this respect, that the orbits of the
latter are more swift, the nearer they are to the centre, whereas the contrary
is the case with the orbits of the former. The seeming contradiction is thus
accounted for by Beatrice. In the material world, the more ample the body is,
the greater is the good of which it is capable ; supposing all the parts to be
equally perfect. But in the intelligential world, the circles are more excellent
and powerful, the more they approximate to the central point, which is God.
Thus the first circle, that of the seraphim, corresponds to the ninth sphere, or
primum mobile ; the second, that of the cherubim, to the eighth sphere, or
heaven of fixed stars ; the third, or circle of thrones, to the seventh sphere, or
planet of Saturn ; and in like manner throughout the two other trines of
circles and spheres.

In orbs

Of circuit inexpressible they stood,

Orb within orb. Milton, P. L. b. 5. 59G.

2 The north.] By "ond' e piu leno," some understand that point from
whence "the wind is mildest ;" others, that "in which there is most force."
The former interpretation is probably right.

460 THE VISION. 73-112.

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 l did outmillion the account
Reduplicate upon the chequer'd board.
Then heard I echoing on, from choir to choir,
" Hosanna," to the fix'd point, that holds,
And shall for ever hold them to their place,
From everlasting, irremovable.

Musing awhile I stood : and she, who saw
My inward meditations, thus began :
" In 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
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,2
Breathe up in warbled melodies threefold
Hosannas, blending ever ; from the three,
Transmitted, hierarchy of gods, for aye
Rejoicing ; dominations 3 first ; next them,

1 In number.] The sparkles exceeded the number which would be produced by
the sixty-four squares of a chess-board, if for the first we reckoned one ; for the
next, two ; for the third, four ; and so went on doubling to the end of the account.

2 Fearless of bruising from the nightly ram.] Not injured, like the produc-
tions of our spring, by the influence of autumn, when the constellation Aries
rises at sunset.

3 Dominations.']

Hear, all ye angels, progeny of light,

Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers.

Milton, P. L. b. 5. 601.

113—130. PARADISE, Canto XXIX. 461

Virtues ; and powers the third ; the next to whom

Are princedoms and archangels, with glad round

To tread their festal ring ; and last, the hand

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,1 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 read.

But soon as in this heaven his doubting eyes

Were open'd, Gregory 2 at his error smiled.

Nor marvel, that a denizen of earth

Should scan such secret truth ; for he had learnt 3

Both this and much beside of these our orbs,

From an eye-witness to heaven's mysteries."

CAISTTO XXIX.

Argument.

Beatrice beholds, in the mirror of divine truth, some doubts which hail
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.

No longer,4 than what time Latona's twins
Cover'd of Libra and the fleecy star,

1 Dionysius.] The Areopagite, in his book De Ccclesti Uicrarcliid.

2 Gregory.'] Gregory the Great. " Novem vero angelorum ordines dix-
imus ; quia videlicet esse, testante sacro eloquio, scimus : Angelos, arcli-
angelos, virtutes, potestates, principatus, dominationes, thronos, cherubin
atque seraphin." Divi Gregorii, Horn, xxxiv. t 125, ed. Par. 1518, fol.

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 heavenly host before his eyes,"
(vol. 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.

4 iVo longer.] As short a space, as the sun and moon are in changing hemi-
spheres, when they are opposite to one another, the one under the sign of
Aries, and the other under that of Libra, and both hang, for a moment, poised
as it were in the hand of the zenith.

462 THE VISION. 3—32.

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 :

" I 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 if in dull inaction, torpid, lay.

For, not in process of before or aft,1

Upon these waters moved the Spirit of God.

Simple and mix'd, both form and substance,2 forth

To perfect being started, like three darts

Shot from a bow three-corded. And as ray

In crystal, glass, and amber, shines entire,

E'en at the moment of its issuing ; thus

Did, from the eternal Sovran, beam entire

His threefold operation,3 at one act

Produced coeval. Yet, in order, each

Created his due station knew : those highest,

1 For, not in jirocess of before or oft.] There was neither " before nor after,"
no distinction, that is, of time, till the creation of the world.

2 Simjile and mix'd, both form and substance.] Simple and unmixed form
answers to " pure intelligence," v. 33, (puro atto,) the highest of created being ;
simple and unmixed substance, to "mere power," v. 33, (pura potenzia,) the
lowest ; and form mixed with substance, to "intelligence and power," v. 35,
(potenzia con atto,) that which holds the middle place between the other two.
This, which appears sufficiently plain, Lombardi has contrived to perplex ; not
being aware of the high sense in which our Poet here and elsewhere uses the
word " forma," as the Greek writers employed the term /*<>%<?>;, and particularly
Saint Paul, Philippians, ii. 6. The following is a remarkable instance in our
language : "A man, though he have one form already, viz. the natural soul ;
it hinders not but he may have also another, the quickening Spirit of God.'
Henry More, Disc. xiii.

3 His threefold operation.] He means that spiritual beings, brute matter,
and the intermediate part of the creation which participates both of spirit and
matter, were produced at once.

For, as there are three natures, schoolmen call

One corporal only, th' other spiritual,

Like single ; so there is a third commixt

Of body and spirit together, placed betwixt

Those other two. Ben Jonson, Eupheme.

33—54. PARADISE, Canto XXIX. 463

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,1 thou hast seen.

But that what I disclose to thee is true,

Those penmen,2 whom the Holy Spirit moved,

In many a passage of their sacred book,

Attest ; as thou by diligent search shalt find :

And reason,3 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 triple question 4 rose.

Ere one had reckon'd twenty, e'en so soon,

Part of the angels fell : and, in their fall,

Confusion to your elements 6 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,

1 On 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. "Sex
millia noudum nostri orbis implentur anni ; et quantas prius seternitates,
quanta tempora, quantas saeculorum origines i'uisse arbitrandum est, in quibus
Angeli, Throni, Dominationes, caeteraeque Virtutes servierint Deo ; et absque
temporum vicibus atque mensuris Deo jubente substiterint." llieronym. In
Epist. ad Titian, 1. Paris edit. 1706, torn. iv. part i. p. 411. " Dicendum,
quod supra hoc invenitur duplex sanctorum doctorum sententia, ilia tamen
probabilior videtur, quod angeli simul cum creatura corporea sunt creati.
Angeli enim sunt quaedam pars universi. Non enim constituunt per se unum
universum, sed tarn ipsi quam creatura corporea in constitutionem unius
universi conveniunt. Quod apparet ex ordine unius creatura? ad aliam. Ordo
enim rerum adinvicem est bonum universi. Nulla autem pars perfecta est a
suo toto separata. Non est igitur probabile, ut Deus cujus perfecta sunt opera,
ut dicitur Deuteron. 32. creaturam angelicam seorsum ante alias creaturas
creaverit. Quamvis contrarium non sit reputandum erroneum, praecipue
propter Sententiam Greg. Nazian. cujus tanta est in doctrina Christiana
authoritas, ut nullus unquam ejus dictis calumniam inferre praesumpserit sicut
nee Athanasii Documentis, ut Hieron. dicit." Thomas Aquinas, Summa
Theolog, p. lma, Quaest. lxi. art. iii.

2 Those penmen.] As in Genesis, i. 1, and Ecclesiasticus, xviii. 1.

3 Reason.] The heavenly ministers (motori) would have existed to no
purpose if they had been created before the corporeal world, which they
were to govern.

4 The triple question.'] He had wished to know where, when, and how the
angels had been created, and these three questions had been resolved.

5 Elements.] Alimenti was sometimes put for elementi, by the old Tuscan
writers. See the notes to Eedi's Bacco in Toscana, vol. i. p. 125, Redi, Opere,
8°, Milan, 1809. There is therefore no necessity for the alteration made in
some editions.

464 THE VISION. 55—98.

Their circling. Of that fatal lapse the cause

Was the curst pride of him, whom thou hast seen

Pent x 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,2 even as the soul

With prompt affection welcometh the guest.

Now, without further help, if with good heed

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
Nought 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 bye- 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 wTarp'd : no reckoning made
What blood the sowing of it in the world
Has cost ; what favour for himself he wins,

1 Petit.] See Hell, Canto xxxiv. 105.

2 Meritorious.'] The collator of the Monte Casino MS. boasts of that being
the only text which has " meritorio," " concistorio," and "adjutorio." The
reading is probably right, but I find it is in Landino's edition of 1484, and
Vellutello's of 1544 ; and it may, perhaps, be in many others.

99—132. PARADISE, Canto XXIX. 465

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 disk, as she withdrew :
Another, how the light shrouded itself
Within its tabernacle, and left dark
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,2 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,
1 Go forth and preach impostures to the world,'
But gave them truth 3 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 4 now provides himself with store
Of jests and gibes ; and, so there be no lack
Of laughter, while he vents them, his big cowl
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,5 and others worse

1 Of Bindi and of Lapi.'] Common names of men at Florence.

2 The sheep.] So Milton, Lycidas :

The hungry sheep look up and are not fed,

But swoln with wind and the rank mist they draw,

Rot inwardly.

3 Gave them truth.] "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to
every creature." Mark, xvi. 15.

4 The preacher.] Thus Cowper, Task, b. 2:

'Tis pitiful

To court a grin, when you should woo a soul, etc.

5 Saint Anthony

Fattens xoith this his swine.] On the sale of these blessings, the brothers
of St. Anthony supported themselves and their paramours. From behind
the swine of St. Anthony, our Poet levels a blow at the object of his inveterate
enmity, Boniface VIII., from whom, "in 1297, they obtained the dignity and
privileges of an independent congregation." See Mosheim's Eccles. Jfiston/ in
Dr. Maclaine's Translation, vol. ii. cent. xi. p. ii. c. ii. sec. 28.

2G

466 THE VISION. 133—150.

Than swine, who diet at his lazy board,
Paying with unstampt 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 natures he might count the tribes.
What Daniel 2 of their thousands hath reveal'd,
With finite number, infinite conceals.
The fountain, at whose source these drink their beams,
With light supplies them in as many modes,
As there are splendours that it shines on : eacli
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.

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.

Noon's fervid hour perchance six thousand miles 3
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,
E'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)

i

With unstampt metal.] With false indulgences.

2 Daniel] "Thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand
times ten thousand stood before him." Daniel, vii. 10.

3 Six thousand miles.] He compares the vanishing of the vision to the fading
away of the stars at dawn, when it is noonday six thousand miles off, and the
shadow, formed by the earth over the part of it inhabited by the Poet, is
about to disappear.

13—54. PARADISE, Canto XXX. 467

Engirt x by that it girdeth. Wherefore love,
With loss of other object, forced nie 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.2 Mine eyes did look
On beauty, such, as I believe in sooth,
Not merely to exceed our human ; but,
That save its Maker, none can to the full
Enjoy it. At this point o'erpowei'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,
E'en so remembrance of that witching smile
Hath dispossest 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 s 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 4
Of Paradise ; and one in that array,
Which in the final judgment thou 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 5 the torch thus fitting ever.

1 Engirt.'] " Appearing to be encompassed by these angelic bands, which are
in reality encompassed by it."

2 This turn.] Questa vice. Hence perhaps Milton, P. L. b. 8. 491 :

This turn hath made amends.

3 Forth.] From the ninth sphere to the empyrean, which is mere light.

4 Either mighty host.] Of angels, that remained faithful, and of beatified
souls ; the latter in that form which they will have at the last day.

5 For its own flame.] Thus disposing the spirits to receive its own beatific light.

468 THE VISION. 55—93.

No sooner to my listening ear had come
The brief assurance, than I understood
New virtue into me infused, and sight
Kindled afresh, with vigour to sustain
Excess of light however pure. I look'd ;
And, in the likeness of a river, saw
Light flowing,1 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 odours, 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 diving back, a living topaz each ;
With all this laughter on its bloomy shores ;
Are but a preface, shadowy of the truth 2
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 eye-lids 3 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 :

1 Light flowing.'] " And lie shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as
crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." Kev. xxii. 1.

Underneath a .bright sea flow'd

Of jasper or of liquid pearl. Milton, P. L. b. 3. 518.

2 Shadowy of the truth.]

Son di lor vero ombriferi prefazii.
So Mr. Coleridge, in his Religious Musings, v. 406 :

Life is a vision shadowy of truth.

3 the eaves

Of mine eyelids.] Thus Shakspeare calls the eyelids "penthouse lids."
Macbeth, act i. sc. 3.

94—131. PAKADISE, Canto XXX. 469

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
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 vigour takes.
And as some cliff,2 that from the bottom eyes
His image mirror'd in the crystal flood,
As if to admire his brave appareling
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 ease3
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,4

1 Either court.'] See Note to v. 44.

2 As some cliff.] A lake,

That to the fringed bank with myrtle crown'd

Her crystal mirror holds. Milton, P. L. b. 4. 263.

3 My view with ease.]

Far and wide his eye commands ;

For sight no obstacle found here, nor shade,
But all sun-shine. Milton, P. L. b. 3. 616.

1 In that proud stall.] "Ostenditque milri circa Paradisum lectum claria
et splendidissimis operimentis adornatum — in quo lecto quendam jacere con-
spexi cujus nomen ab Apostolo audivi, sed prohibuit ne cui illud dicerem."
Alberici Visio, sec. 31.

470 THE VISION. 132—146.

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,1 he who, by the world
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,2 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 3
Will sink beneath him : such will be his meed."

CANTO XXXI.

Argument.

The Poet expatiates further on the glorious vision described in the last Canto.
On looking round for Beatrice, he finds that she has left him, and that
an old man is at his side. This proves to he Saint Bernard, who shows
him that Beatrice has returned to her throne, and then points out to him
the blessedness of the Virgin Mother.

In fashion, as a snow white rose, lay then

Before my view the saintly multitude,4

Which in his own blood Christ espoused. Meanwhile,

That other host,5 that soar aloft to gaze

And celebrate his glory, whom they love,

Hover'd around ; and, like a troop of bees,0

Amid the vernal sweets alighting now,

Now, clustering, where their fragrant labour glows,

1 Of the great Harry."] The Emperor Henry VII. who died in 1313.
M Henry, Count of Luxemburgh, held the imperial power three years, seven
months, and eighteen days, from his first coronation to his death. He was a
man wise, and just, and gracious ; brave and intrepid in arms ; a man of
honour and a good catholic ; and although by his lineage he was of no great
condition, yet he was of a magnanimous heart, much feared and held in awe ;
and if he had lived longer, would have done the greatest things. G. Villani,
lib. 9. cap. i. Compare Dino Compagni, Muratori, Tier. Ital. Script, torn. ix.
lib. 3. p. 524, and Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. xxx.

2 He.~\ Pope Clement V. See Canto xxvii. 53.

3 Alagna's priest.'] Pope Boniface VIII. Hell, Canto xix. 79.

4 The saintly multitude.] Human souls, advanced to this state of glory
through the mediation of Christ.

5 That other host.] The angels.

6 Bees.] Compare Homer, Iliad. 2, 87 ; Virg. uEn. 1. 430 ; and Milton,
P. L.bA. 768.

9—36. PARADISE, Canto XXXI. 471

Flew downward to the mighty flower, or rose
From the redundant petals, streaming back
Unto the stedfast 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,
From range to range, fanning their plumy loins,
Whisper'd the peace and ardour, which they won
From that soft winnowing. Shadow none, the \ast
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 charnv'st them thus !
Vouchsafe one glance to gild our storm below.2

If the grim brood,3 from Arctic shores that roam'd,
(Where Helice 4 for ever, 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 5
In greatness more than earthly ; I, who then
From human to divine had past, from time
Unto eternity, and out of Florence
To justice and to truth, how might I chuse

Wings of gold.] the middle pair

Skirted his loins and thighs with downy gold.

Milton, P. L b. 5. 282.

2 To gild our storm below. ] To guide us through the dangers to which we
are exposed in this tempestuous life.

3 If the grim brood.] The northern hordes who invaded Rome. Landino
justly observes, that " this is a most excellent comparison to show how great
his astonishment was at beholding the realms of the blest."

4 Helice.] Callisto, and her son Areas, changed into the constellations of
the Greater Bear and Arctophylax, or Bootes. See Ovid, Met. lib. 2. fab. v. vL

5 The Lateran arose.]

quando Laterano

Alle cose mortali ando di sopra.
This reminds us of the celebrated passage in Akenside :

Mark how the dread Pantheon stands,
Amid the domes of modern hands. Ode xviii. b. 1.

It is remarkable that Dante has no allusion to the magnificence of Gothic
architecture, which was then in so much perfection, and which, as Tiraboschi
endeavours to show, by a passage in Cassiodorus, describing its peculiar
character of slender columns and lanceated arches, was introduced into Italy
so early as the end of the fifth century. See Stor. delta Lett. Ital. torn. iii.
lib. 1.

472 THE VISION. 37—85.

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 honour 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
Once more of things, that held my thought suspens
But answer found from other than I ween'd ;
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 V straight I ask'd.

"By Beatrice summon'd," he replied,
" I 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 clown, unmix'd and pure.

" 0 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 niark'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
Favour with thee." So I my suit preferr'd :
And she, so distant, as appear'd, look'd down,
And smiled ; then towards the eternal fountain turn'd

And thus the senior, holy and revered :
" That thou at length mayst happily conclude

86-107. • PARADISE, Canto XXXI. 473

Thy voyage, (to which end I was dispatch'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,

All gracious aid befriend us ; for that I

Am her own faithful Bernard." 1 Like a wight,

Who haply from Croatia wends to see

Our Veronica ; 2 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

E'en thus, 0 Jesus, my true Lord and God 1

And was this semblance thine ? " So gazed I then

Adoring ; for the charity of him,3

Who musing, in this world that peace enjoy'd,

Stood livelily 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

1 Bernard.] St. Bernard, the venerable abbot of Clairvaux, and the great
promoter of the second crusade, who died A. D. 1153, in his sixty -third year.
His sermons are called by Henault, " chefs-d'oeuvres de sentiment et de force."
Abrege Chron. de VHist. de Fr. 1145. They have even been preferred 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. Ibid. That the part he acts in the present
poem should be assigned to him, appears somewhat remarkable, when we
consider that he severely censured the new festival established in honour of the
Immaculate Conception of the Virgin, and ' ' opposed the doctrine itself with
the greatest vigour, as it supposed her being honoured with a privilege which
belonged to Christ alone." Dr. Maclaine's Mosheim, vol. iii. cent. xii. part ii.
c. iii. sec. 19.

2 Our Veronica.] A vernicle had he sewed upon his cappe.

Chaucer, Frol. to the Canterbury Tales.

"Vernicle, diminutive of Veronike, Fr. A copy in miniature of the picture
of Christ, which is supposed to have been miraculously imprinted upon a
handkerchief preserved in the church of St. Peter at Rome. Du Cange in v.
Veronica Madox, Form. Angl. 1. p. 428. Testam. Joh. de Nevill. an. 1386.
Item Domino Archiepiscopo Eborum fratri meo, vestimentum rubeum de velvet
cum le verouike (r. Veronike) in granis rosarum de super Brondata (r. brou-
data). It was usual for persons returning from pilgrimages, to bring with them
certain tokens of the several places which they had visited : and therefore the
Pardoner, who is just arrived from Rome, is represented with a vernicle sewed
upon his cappe. See Pierce Ploumian, 28, b." Tyrwhitt's Glossary to Chaucer.
Our Poet alludes to this custom in his Vita Nuova, p. 275: "Avvenne in
quel tempo," etc. " It happened, at that time, that many people were going
to see that blessed image, which Jesus Christ left to us for a pattern of his
most beautiful form, which my lady now beholds in glory."

3 Him.] St. Bernard.

474 THE VISION. 108—132.

Seated in state, the queen,1 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 Phaeton

111 knew to guide, and on each part the light

Diminish'd fades, intensest in the midst ;

So burn'd the peaceful oriflamb,2 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. At their glee

And carol, smiled the Lovely One of heaven,

That joy was in the eyes of all the blest.

Had I a tongue in eloquence as rich,
As is the colouring 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
Ardour into my breast, unfelt before.

CANTO XXXII.

Argument.

Saint Bernard shows him, on their several thrones, the other blessed souls,
both of the old and new Testament ; explains to him that their places are
assigned them by grace, and net 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.

Freely the sage, though wrapt in musings high,
Assumed the teacher's part, and mild began :
" The wound, that Mary closed, she 3 open'd first,
Who sits so beautiful at Mary's feet.

i

The queen.'] The Virgin Mary.

2 Oriflamb.'] Menage on this word quotes the P^oman des Royaux Lignages
of Guillaume Ghyart :

Orflamme est une banniere
De cendal roujoyant et simple
Sans portraiture d'autre affaire.

3 She.] Eve.

5—46. PARADISE, CaWTO XXXII. 475

The third in order, underneath her, lo !
Rachel with Beatrice : Sarah next ;
Judith ; Rebecca ; and the gleaner- maid,
Meek ancestress l 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 blooms
Each leaf in full maturity, are set
Such as in Christ, or e'er he came, believed.
On the other, where an intersected space
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,2 of hell,
Yet still continued holy,) and beneath,
Augustin ; 3 Francis ; 4 Benedict ; 5 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 subtil thoughts have bound thee. From this realm
Excluded, chance no entrance here may find ;
No more than hunger, thirst, or sorrow can.

1 Ancestress.] Ruth, the ancestress of David.

2 Two years.] The time that elapsed between the death of the Baptist and
his redemption by the death of Christ.

3 Augustin.] Bishop of Hippo, in the fourth century ; the celebrated writer
who has been mentioned before, Canto x. 117.

4 Francis.] See Canto xi.

5 Benedict.] See Canto xxii.

476 THE VISION. 47—82.

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 corners 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 farther, every soul,
Created in his joyous sight to dwell,
With grace, at pleasure, variously * endows.
And for a proof the effect may well suffice.
And 'tis moreover most expressly mark'd
In holy Scripture,2 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 splendour 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.

1 Variously.'] There can be no doubt but that "Intra Be," and not
" Entrassi," is the right reading at v. 60 of the original. The former seems
to have been found in only a few MSS. ; but it appears from Landino's notes,
that he had intended to adopt it ; although Lombardi has been, as far as I
know, the first to admit it into the text.

2 In holy Scrijrtiire.] "And the children struggled together within her."
Gen. xxv. 22. " When Rebekah also had conceived by one, even by our father
Isaac ; (for the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or
evil, that the promise of God according to election might stand, not of works,
but of him that calleth ;) it was said unto her, The elder shall serve the
younger." Rom. ix. 10, 11, 12. Care must be taken that the doctrine of
election is not pushed further than St. Paul appears to have intended by this
text, which regards the preference of the Jews to the Gentiles, and not merely
the choice of particular persons, without any respect to merit.

83—129. PARADISE, Canto XXXII. 477

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,
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 his 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,1
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,2 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

1 The seer.] S. John.

2 Lucia.] See Hell, Canto ii. 97, and Purgatory, ix. 50.

478 THE VISION. 130— 13d

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 y_ield me all thy heart." He said ;

And thus the saintly orison began.

CANTO XXXIII.

QxQKmtnt

Saint Bernard supplicates the Virgin Mary that Dante may have grace given
him to contemplate the brightness of the Divine Majesty, which is accord-
ingly 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 great mystery ; the Trinity, and the Union of
Man with God.

"0 virgin mother,1 daughter of thy Son !
Created beings all in lowliness
Surpassing, as in height above them all ;
Term by the eternal counsel pre-ordain'd ;

1 0 virgin mother.]

Thou maide and mother daughter of thy son,

Thou wel of mercy, sinful soules cure,

In whom that God of bountee chees to won ;

Thou humble and high over every creature,

Thou nobledest so far forth our nature,

That no disdaine the maker had of kinde

His son in blood and flesh to clothe and winde.

Within the cloistre blisful of thy sides
Toke mannes shape the eternal love and pees,
That of the trine compas Lord and guide is,
Whom erthe, and sea, and heven out of rellees
Ay herien ; and thou virgin wemmeles
Bare of thy body (and dweltest maiden pure)
The Creatour of every creature.

Assembled in thee magnificence
With mercy, goodness, and with such pitee,
That thou that art the sunne of excellence
Not only helpest hem that praisen thee,
But oftentime of thy benignitee
Ful freely, or that men thin helpe beseche,
Thou goest beforne, and art hir lives leche."

Chaucer, The Second Nonnes Tale.
In the stanza preceding these, Chaucer alludes to St. Bernard's writings :
And thou that art floure of virgins all,
Of whom that Bernard list so well to write.

5-36. PARADISE, Canto XXXIII. 47<J

Ennobler of thy nature, so advanced

In thee, that its great Maker did not scorn,

To make himself his own creation ; l

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 2

Fly without wings. Not only him, who asks,

Thy bounty succours ; 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,3 that on the sovran joy

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.

1 To make himself his own creation.] Non si sdegno di farsi sua fattura. 1
had translated this line,

Himself in his own work enclosed to dwell,
and have corrected it at the suggestion of my friend, the Rev. William Digby,
who points out a parallel passage in Bishop Hopkins, on the Lord's Prayer,
ed. 1692, p. 190: "In Him omnipotence became weak; eternity, mortal;
innocence itself, guilty ; God, man ; the Creator, a creature ; the Maker of all,
his own workmanship."

2 Desire.] - Lo his desire woll flie withouten winges.

Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, lib. 3.

Che '1 desiderio sempre move l'ale
Dietro all' oggetto della mente appreso.

Frezzi, II Quadrir. lib. 3. cap. iii.
8 Through thine men prayers.] Here again I am indebted to Mr. Digby for
noticing the omission of " co' prieghi tuoi " in my former translation of the
passage- which stood thus :

That on the sovran pleasure he may gaze,
This also I entreat of thee, 0 queen.

480 THE VISION. 37—80.

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 ardour 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.1 0 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 2 from the living ray I met,
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.

0 grace, unen vying of thy boon ! that gavest .
Boldness to fix so earnestly my ken
On the everlasting splendour, that I look'd,
While sight was unconsumed ; and, in that depth,

1 The SibyVs sentence.] Virg. JZn. 3. 445.

8 Such keenness. ] tli' air,

No where so clear, sharpen'd his visual ray,

To objects distant far. Milton, P. L. b. 3., 621.

81—109. PARADISE, Canto XXXIII. 481

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 moment2 seems a longer lethargy,

Than five-and-twenty ages had appear 'd

To that emprize, that first made Neptune wonder

At Argo's shadow 3 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, dipt in one bound : 4

1 All properties.] Thus in the Parmenides of Plato, it is argued that all
conceivable quantities and qualities, however contradictory, are necessarily
inherent in our idea of a universe or unity.

2 One moment.'] "A moment seems to me more tedious, than five-and-
twenty ages would have appeared to the Argonauts, when they had resolved
on their expedition." Lombardi proposes a new interpretation of this difficult
passage, and would understand our author to say that " one moment elapsed
after the vision, occasioned a greater forgetfulhess of what he had seen, than
the five-and-twenty centuries, which past between the Argonautic expedition
and the time of his writing this poem, had caused oblivion of the circumstances
attendant on that event."

3 Argo's shadow.]

Quse simul ac rostro ventosum proscidit sequor,
Tortaque remigio spumis incanduit unda,
Emersere feri candenti e gurgite vultus
iEquoreae monstrum Nereides admirantes.

Catullus, De Nupt. Pel. et Thet. 15.

The wondred Argo, which in wondrous piece

First through the Euxine seas bore all the flower of Greece.

Spenser, Faery Queen, b. 2. c. xii. st. 44.

4 Three orbs of triple hue, dipt in one bound.] The Trinity. This passago
may be compared to what Plato, in his second Epistle, enigmatically says of a

2E

482 THE VISION. 110—135.

And, from another, one reflected seem'd,

As rainbow is from rainbow : and the third

Seem'd fire, breathed equally from both. 0 speech !

How feeble and how faint art thou, to give

Conception birth. Yet this to what I saw

Is less than little.1 O eternal light !

Sole in thyself that dwell' st ; and of thyself

Sole understood, past, present, or to come ;

Thou smiledst,2 on that circling,3 which in thee

Seem'd as reflected splendour, while I mused ;

For I therein, methought, in its own hue

Beheld our image painted : stedfastly

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 vigour fail'd the towering fantasy :
But 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 star?..

first, second, and third, and of the impossibility that the human soul should
attain to what it desires to know of them, by means of any thing akin to
itself.

1 Less than little.] Che '1 pavon vi parrebhe men che poco.

Fazio degli Uberti, Dittamondo, lib. 2. cap. v.

2 Thou smiledst.] Some MSS. and editions instead of "intendente te a me
arridi," have " intendente te ami ed arridi," "who, understanding thyself,
lovest and enjoyest thyself ; " which Lombardi thinks much preferable.

3 That circling.] The second of the circles, " Light of Light," in which he
dimly beheld the mystery of the incarnation.

THE END.

INDEX OF PROPEK NAMES,

EITHER EXPRESSLY MENTIONED, OR SUPPOSED TO BE REFERRED TO
IN THE PRECEDING POEM.

Abbagliato, 77. xxix. 129.

Abbati, Par. xvi. 109.

Abbati degli, Bocca 77. xxxii. 105.

Abbati degli, Buoso, H. xxv. 131.

Abel, 77. iv. 53.

Abraham, II. iv. 55.

Absalom, 77. xxviii. 132.

Abydos, Purg. xxviii. 74.

Accorso, 77. xv. 110.

Accorso d', Francesco, 77. xv. 111.

Achan, Purg. xx. 107.

Acheron, H. iii. 72 ; xiv. 111. Purg.

ii. 100.
Achilles, H. v. 65 ; xii. 68 ; xxvi. 63 ;

xxxi. 4. Purg. ix. 32 ; xxi. 93.
Acone, Par. xvi. 64.
Acquacheta, II. xvi. 97.
Acquasparta, Par. xii. 115.
Acre, II. xxvii. 84.
Adam, 77. iii. 107 ; iv. 52. Purg. ix.

9 ; xi. 45 ; xxix. 84 ; xxxii. 37 ;

xxxiii. 62. Par. vii. 22 ; xiii. 34,

77 ; xxvi. 82, 100 ; xxxii. 108, 122.
Adamo of Brescia, 77. xxx. 60, 103.
Adice, H. xii. 4. Purg. xvi. 117.

Par. ix. 44.
Adimari, Par. xvi. 113.
Adrian V. Purg. xix. 97.
Adriatic, Par. xxi. 114.
^Egina, 77. xxix. 58.
JEneas, II. ii. 34 ; iv. 119 ; xxvi. 62,

92. Purg. xviii. 135 ; xxi. 98. Par.

vi. 3 ; xv. 26.
^Esop, 77. xxiii. 5.
^Ethiop, Purg. xxvi. 18. Par. xix.

108.
Africanus. See Scipio.
Agamemnon, Par. v. 69.
Agapete I. Par. vi. 16.
Agatho, Purg. xxii. 105.
Aghinulfo of Romena, II. xxx. 76.
Aglanros, Purg. xiv. 142.
Agnello. See Brunelleschi.
Agobbio, Purg. xi. 80.
Agobbio d', Oderigi, Purg. xi. 79.
Agostino, Par. xii. 122.

Aguglione d', Baldo, Par. xvi. 54.

Ahasuerus, Purg. xvii. 28.

Ahitophel, 77. xxviii. 133.

Alagia, Purg. xix. 141.

Alagna, Purg. xx. 86. Par. xxx. 145.

Alardo, II. xxviii. 17.

Alba, Par. vi. 38.

Alberichi, Par. xvi. 87.

Alberigo. See Manfredi.

Albero of Sienna, 77. xxix. 105.

Albert I. Purg. vi. 98. Par. xix. 114.

Alberti degli, Alberto, II. xxxii. 55.

Alberti degli, Alessandro, 77. xxxii. 53.

Alberti degli, Napoleone, 77. xxxii. 53.

Alberto, Abbot of San Zeno, Purg.

xviii. 118.
Albertus Magnus, Par. x. 95.
Alcides, 77. xxv. 30 ; xxxi. 123.
Alcmaeon, Purg. xii. 46. Par. iv. 1C0.
Aldobrandesco, Guglielmo, I'vrg. xi.

59.
Aldobrandesco, Omberto, Purg. xi. 58,

67.
Aldobrandi, Tegghiaio, II. vi. 79 ; xvi.

42.
Alecto, II. ix. 48.

Alessandro of Romena, 77. xxx. 76.
Alessio. See Interminei.
Alexander Pheraeus, 77. xii. 106.
Alexander the Great, 77. xiv. 28.
Alexandria, Purg. vii. 137.
Ali, 77. xxviii. 32.
Alichino, 77. xxi. 116 ; xxii. 111.
Alighieri, son of Cacciaguida, Par. xv.

86.
Alonzo III. king of Arragon, Purg.

vii. 116.
Alonzo X. of Spain, Par. xix. 122.
Alp, H. xx. 58.
Alpine, Purg. xiv. 33 ; xxxiii. 110.

Par. vi. 52.
Alverna, Par. xi. 98.
Amata, Purg. xvii. 34.
Amidei, Par. xvi. 135.
Amphiaraus, 77. xx. 31. Par. iv. 100.
Amphion, 77. xxxii. 11.

483

484

INDEX.

Amyclas, Par. xi. 63.

Anacreon, Purg. xxii. 105.

Ananias, Par. xxvi. 13.

Ananias, the husband of Sapphira,

Purg. xx. 109.
Anastagio, Purg. xiv. 109.
Anastasius, H. xi. 9.
Anaxagoras, H. iv. 135.
Anchises, H. i. 69 ; iv. 119 ; xxvi. 94.

Par. xv. 25 ; xix. 128.
Andes, Purg. xviii. 84.
Andrea da Sant', Giacomo, II. xiii.

134.
Angelo. See Cagnano.
Ann, Saint, Par. xxxii. 119.
Annas, //. xxiii. 124.
Anselm, Par. xii. 128.
Anselm, son of Count Ugolino <le'

Gherardeschi, H. xxxiii. 48.
Antaeus, H. xxxi. 92, 103, 131.
Antandros, Par. vi. 69.
Antenor, Purg. v. 75.
Antenora, H. xxxii. 89.
Antigone, Purg. xxii. 108.
Antiochus, II. xix. 90.
Anthony, Saint, Par. xxix. 131.
Apennine, II. xvi. 96 ; xx. 63. Purg.

v. 94 ; xxx. 87. Par. xxi. 97.
Apollo, Purg. xx. 127. Par. i. 12;

ii. 9.
Apulia, //. xxviii. 7. See Pouille.
Apulian, //. xxviii. 15.
Aquarius, //. xxiv. 2.
Aquinum, Purg. xxii. 14. Par. x. 96 ;

xiv. 6.
Arab, Par. vi. 50.

Arachne, H. xvii. 18. Purg. xii. 39.
Aragonia, Purg. iii. 113.
Arbia, II. x. 84.
Area, Par. xvi. 90.
Archiano, Purg. v. 93, 122.
Arctic, Par. xxxi. 28.
Ardelaffi. See Ordelaffi.
Ardinghi, Par. xvi. 91.
Arethusa, H. xxv. 89.
Arezzo, H. xxii. 6 ; xxix. 104 ; xxx.

32. Purg. vi. 14 ; xiv. 49.
Argenti, Fiiippo, 7/. viii. 59.
Argia, Purg. xxii. 109.
Argive, II. xxviii. 81.
Argo, Par. xxxiii. 92.
Argonauts, Par. ii. 17 ; xxxiii. 91.
Argus, Purg. xxix. 91 ; xxxii. 63.
Ariadne, Par. xiii. 12.
Aries, Purg. viii. 135 ; xxxii. 52. Par.

i. 39 ; xxviii. 106.
Aristotle, H. iv. 128 ; xi. 104. Purg.

iii. 41. Par. viii. 125.
Arius, Par. xiii. 123.

Aries, //. ix. 111.

Arnault. See Daniel.

Arno, H. xiii. 148 ; xv. 115 ; xxiii. 95 ;

xxx. 65 ; xxxiii. 83. Purg. v. 123 ;

xiv. 26. Par. xi. 99.
Arrigo. See Fifanti.
Arrigucci, Par. xvi. 106.
Arthur, H. xxxii. 59.
Aruns, H. xx. 43.
Ascesi, Par. xi. 49.
Asciano, Caccia of, H. xxix. 127.
Asdente, //. xx. 116.
Asopus, Purg. xviii. 92.
Assyrians, Purg. xii. 54.
Athamas, II. xxx. 4.
Athens, II. xii. 17. Purg. vi. 141 ;

xv. 96. Par. xvii. 46.
Atropos, H. xxxiii. 124.
Attila, II. xii. 134 ; xiii. 150.
Aventine, H. xxv. 25.
Averroes, II. iv. 141.
August, Purg. v. 38.
Augustine, Saint, Par. x. 117 ; xxxii.

30.
Augustus, Par. xxx. 136. See Caesar.
Avicen, //. iv. 140.
Aulis, H. xx. 109.
Aurora, Purg. ii. 8 ; ix. 1.
Ausonia, Par. viii. 63.
Ausonian, Par. xi. 98.
Austrian, H. xxxii. 26.
Azzo of, Ubaldini, Purg. xiv. 107-
Azzolino. See Eomano.

Babylonian, Par. xxiii. 129.
Bacchiglione, //. xv. 115. Par. ix. 47.
Bacchus, II. xx. 55. Purg. xviii. 93.

Par. xiii. 22.
Bagnacavallo, Purg. xiv. 118.
Bagnoregio, Par. xii. 119.
Balearic, //. xxviii. 79.
Baliol, John, Par. xix. 121.
Baptist. See John.
Barbariccia, H. xxi. 118 ; xxii. 30, 57,

142.
Barbarossa. See Frederick.
Bari, Par. viii. 64.
Barucci, Par. xvi. 102.
Battifolle da, Frederigo Novello, Purg.

vi. 17.
Beatrice, daughter of Folco Portinari,

passim.
Beatrice, Marchioness of Este, Purg.

viii. 73.
Beatrix, wife of Charles I., king of

Naples, Purg. vii. 129. Par. vi. 135.
Beccaria, II. xxxii. 116.
Bede, Par. x. 127.
Begga, Par. ix. 88.

INDEX.

486

Belacqua, Purg. iv. 119.

Belisarius, Par. vi. 25.

Bella della, Giano, Par. xvi. 130.

Bellincion. See Berti.

Bello del, Geri, 27. xxix. 26.

Belus, Par. ix. 93.

Belzebub, 27. xxxiv. 122.

Benacus, H. xx. 60, 72, 75.

Benedict, Saint, 7'(tr. xxii. 38 ; xxxii.

30.
Benedict, Saint, the Abbey, 27. xvi.

100.
Benevento, Purg. iii. 124.
Benincasa d' Arezzo, Purg. vi. 14.
Berenger, Raymond, Par. vi. 136.
Bergamese, 27. xx. 70.
Bernard the Franciscan, Par. xi. 72.
Bernard, Saint, Par. xxxi. 55, 93, 130 ;

xxxii. 1 ; xxxiii. 47.
Bernardin. See Fosco.
Bernardone, Pietro, Par. xi. 83.
Berti, Bellincion, Par. xv. 106 ; xvi.

96, 119.
Bertrand. See Born.
Bethlehem, Purg. xx. 135.
Bianco, 27. xxiv. 149.
Billi, Par. xvi. 100.
Bindi, Par. xxix. 111.
Birtha, Par. xiii. 135.
Bisenzio, 72. xxxii. 54.
Bismantua, Purg. iv. 25.
Bocca. See Abbati.
Boetius, Par. x. 119.
Bohemia, Purg. vii. 98. Par. xix. 116.
Bohemian, Par. xix. 123.
Bologna, H. xviii. 58 ; xxiii. 105, 144.

Purg. xiv. 102.
Bolognian, Purg. xi. 83.
Bolsena, Purg. xxiv. 25.
Bonatti, Guido, II. xx. 116.
Bonaventura, Saint, Par. xii. 25, 118.
Boniface, Purg. xxiv. 30.
Boniface VIII. H. xix. 55 ; xxvii. 81.

Purg. xx. 85 ; xxxii. 146. Par. ix.

134; xii. 82; xxii. 14; xxvii. 20;

xxx. 145.
Bonturo. See Dati.
Borgo, Par. xvi. 132.
Born de, Bertrand, H. xxviii. 130 ;

xxix. 27.
Borneil de, Giraud, Purg. xxvi. 113.
Borsiere, Guglielmo, 77. xvi. 70.
Bostichi, Par. xvi. 91.
Botaio, Martino, H. xxi. 37.
Brabant, Purg. vi. 24.
Branca. See Doria.
Branda, H. xxx. 77.
Brennus, Par. vi. 44.
Brenta, 77. xv. 8. Par. ix. 28.

Brescia, II. xx. 66.

Bnedan, 77. xx. 70.

Brettinoro, Purg. xiv. 144.

Briareus, 77. xxxi. 90. Purg. xii. 25.

Brigata, son of Count Ugolino de*

Gherardeschi, II. xxxiii. 88.
Brosse de la, Peter, Purg. vi. 23.
Bruges, 27. xv. 5. Purg. xx. 46.
Brundusium, Purg. iii. 26.
Brunelleschi, Agnello, II. xxv. 61.
Brunette See Latini.
Brutus, Junius, the expeller of Tar-

quin, 27. iv. 123.
Brutus, Marcus, the slayer of Caesar,

27. xxxiv. 61. Par. vi. 76.
Bryso, Par. xiii. 121.
Bujamonti, Giovanni, 27. xvii. 69.
Bulicame, 27. xiv. 76.
Buonacossi, Pinamonte, II. xx. 95.
Buonaggiunta Urbiciani, Purg. xxiv.

20, twice.
Buonconte, Purg. v. 87.
Buondelmonti, Par. xvi. 65.
Buondelmonti de', Buondelmonte,

Par. xvi. 139.
Buosi. See Donati.

Caccia. See Asciano.

Cacciaguida, Par. xv. 84, 128 ; xvii. 6.

Caccianimico, Venedico, 27. xviii. 50.

Cacus, 27. xxv. 24.

Cadmus, 27. xxv. 89.

Caecilius, Purg. xxii. 97.

Caesar, H. xiii. 68. Purg. vi. 93, 116.

Par. vi. 10 ; xvi. 57.
Caesar, Augustus, 27. i. 67. Purg.

vii. 5 ; xxix. 111. Par. vi. 75.
Caesar, Julius, H. i. 65 ; iv. 120.

Purg. xviii. 99 ; xxvi. 70. Par. xi.

64.
Cagnano, the river, Par. ix. 48.
Cagnano da, Angelo or Angiolello, II.

xxviii. 73.
Cagnazzo, H. xxi. 117 ; xxii. 105.
Cahors, 27. xi. 53.
Cahorsines, Par. xxvii. 53.
Caiaphas, 27. xxiii. 117.
Caieta, 27. xxvi. 91.
Cain, 27. xx. 123. Purg. xiv. 137.

Par. ii. 52.
Cai'na, H. v. 105 ; xxxii. 57.
Calabria, Par. xii. 131.
Calboli da, Fulcieri, Purg. xiv. 61.
Calboli da, Rinieri, Purg. xiv. 91, 92.
Calcabrina, H. xxi. 117 ; xxii. 133.
Calchas, H. xx. 109.
Calfucci, Par. xvi. 104.
Callaroga, Par. xii. 48.
Calliope, Purg. i. 9.

486

INDEX.

Callisto, Purg. xxv. 126.
Callixtus I., Par. xxvii. 40.
Camaldoli, Purg. v. 94.
Camiccione, Alberto ; de' Pazzi, II.

xxxii. 66.
Camilla, H. i. 104 ; iv. 120.
Camino da, Gherardo, Purg. xvi. 126,

137, 142.
Camiuo da, Riccardo, Par. ix. 48.
Camonica, //. xx. 62.
Campagnatico, Purg. xi. 66.
Campaldino, Purg. v. 90.
Campi, Par. xvi. 48.
Canavese, Purg. vii. 138.
Cancellieri de', Focaccia, //. xxxii. 60.
Cancer, Par. xxv. 102.
Capaneus, H. xiv. 59.
Capet, Hugh, Purg. xx. 48.
Capocchio, H. xxix. 134 ; xxx. 28.
Caponsacco, Par. xvi. 120.
Capraia, H. xxxiii. 82.
Capricorn, Purg. ii. 55. Par. xxvii.

63.
Caprona, H. xxi. 92.
Capulets, Purg. vi. 107.
Cariseuda, II. xxxi. 128.
Carlino. See Pazzi.
Carpigna di, Guido ; da Montefeltro.

Purg. xiv. 100.
Carrara, //. xx. 45.
Casale, Par. xii. 115.
Casalodi, H. xx. 94.
Casella, Purg. ii. 88.
Caseutino, H. xxx. 64. Purg. v. 92 ;

xiv. 45.
Cassero del, Giacopo, Purg. v. 73.
Cassero del, Guido, H. xxviii. 73.
Cassino, Par. xxii. 36.
Cassius, //. xxxiv. 62. Par. vi. 76.
Castello, Guido da, Purg. xvi. 127.
Castile, Par. xii. 49.
Castroearo, Purg. xiv. 118.
Catalano. See Malavolti.
Catalonia, Par. viii. 83.
Catilini, Par. xvi. 86.
Cato, H. iv. 124 ; xiv. 15. Purg. i.

31 ; ii. 113.
Catria, Par. xxi. 99.
Cattolica, II. xxviii. 77.
Cavalcante, Francesco Guercio, H.

xxv. 142.
Cavalcanti, H. xxx. 33.
Cavalcanti de', Cavalcante, //. x. 52.
Cavalcanti, Guido, II. x. 62. Purg.

xi. 96.
Cecina, //. xiii. 10.
Celestiue V. //. iii. 56 ; xxvii. 101.
Centaurs, II. xii. 53, 103, 116, 128;

xxv. 17. Purg. xxiv. 120.

Ceperano, H. xxviii. 14.

Cephas, Par. xxi. 118.

Cerbaia da, Count Orso, Purg. vi. 20.

Cerberus, H. vi. 12, 22, 31 ; ix. 97.

Cerchi, Par. xvi. 63.

Ceres, Purg. xxviii. 52.

Certaldo, Par. xvi. 48.

Cervia, H. xxvii. 40.

Cesena, H. xxvii. 50.

Ceuta, //. xxvi. 109.

Charlemain, H. xxxi. 15. Par. vi.

98 ; xviii. 39.
Charles of Lorraine, Purg. xx. 52.
Charles Martel, Par. viii. 50 ; ix. 1.
Charles of Valois, II. vi. 69. Purg.

xx. 69. Par. vi. 110.
Charles I. of Anjou, king of Naples,

H. xix. 103. Purg. v. 69 ; vii. 114,

125 ; xi. 137 ; xx. 59, 65. Par. viii.

77.
Charles II. king of Naples, Purg. vii.

125. Par. xix. 125 ; xx. 58.
Charon, H. iii. 89, 101, 119.
Charybdis, H. vii. 22.
Chebar, Purg. xxix. 97.
Chiana, Par. xiii. 21.
Chiaramontesi, Par. xvi. 103.
Chiarentana, H. xv. 10.
Chiascio, Par. xi. 40.
Chiassi, Purg. xxviii. 20.
Chiaveri, Purg. xix. 99.
Chiron, //. xii. 62, 69, 74, 95. Purg.

ix. 34.
Chiusi, Par. xvi. 74.
Christ, Jesus, H. xxxiv. 110. Purg.

xx. 86 ; xxi. 6 ; xxiii. 67 ; xxvi.

121 ; xxxii. 101. Par. vi. 15 ; ix.

117 ; xi. 66, 99 ; xii. 35, 66, 67, 68 ;

xiv. 96, 98, 101 ; xvii. 50 ; xix. 68,

102, 105 twice; xx. 42; xxiii. 20,

71 ; xxv. 35 ; xxvii. 36 ; xxix. 103,

115 ; xxxi. 3, 99 ; xxxii. 17, 19, 22,

73, 75, 111.
Christians, H. xxvii. 84. Purg. x.

110 ; xxii. 74, 90. Par. v. 74 ; xv.

128; xix. 108; xx. 96; xxiv. 53,

105 ; xxvii. 44.
Chrysostom, Saint, Par. xii. 128.
Ciacco, H. vi. 52, 58.
Ciampolo, H. xxii. 47.
Cianfa. See Donati.
Cianghella, Par. xv. 120.
Cieldauro, Par. x. 124.
Cimabue, Purg. xi. 93.
Cincinnatus. See Quintius.
Circe, H. xxvi. 90. Purg. xiv. 45.
Ciriatto, II. xxi. 120 ; xxii. 54.
Clare, Saint, Par. iii. 99.
Clement IV. Purg. iii. 122.

INDEX.

487

Clement V., H. xix. 86. Purg. xxxii.

155. Par. xvii. 80 ; xxvii. 53 ;

xxx. 141.
Clemenza, Par. ix. 2.
Cleopatra, //. v. 62. Par. vi. 79.
Cletus, Par. xxvii. 37.
Clio, Pun/, xxii. 58.
Clotho, Purg. xxi. 28.
Clymene, Par. xvii. 1.
Coan, Purg. xxix. 133.
Cocytus, H. xiv. 114 ; xxxi. 114 ;

xxxiii. 154 ; xxxiv. 48.
Colchos, H. xviii. 86. Par. ii. 18.
Colle, Purg. xiii. 108.
Cologne, H. xxiii. 63. Par. x. 95.
Colonnesi, H. xxvii. 82.
Conio, Counts of, Purg. xiv. 119.
Conrad. See Malaspina and Palazzo.
Conrad I., Par. xv. 132.
Conradine, Purg. xx. 66.
Constance, Empress, Purg. iii. 111.

Par. iii. 121 ; iv. 95.
Constantine the Great, H. xix. 118 ;

xxvii. 89. Par. v. 1 ; xx. 50.
Conti Guidi, Par. xvi. 62.
Cornelia, H. iv. 125. Par. xv. 122.
Corneto, H. xiii. 10.
Corneto da, Riniero, H. xii. 137.
Corsic, Purg. xviii. 81.
Cortigiani, Par. xvi. 110.
Cosenza, Purg. iii. 121.
Costanza, Empress. See Constance.
Costanza, Queen, Purg. iii. 112, 138 ;

vii. 130.
Crassus, Purg. xx. 114.
Crete, H. xii. 13 ; xiv. 90.
Creusa, Par. ix. 94.
Croatia, Par. xxxi. 94.
Crotona, Par. viii. 64.
Cunizza, Par. ix. 32.
Cupid, Par. viii. 9.
Curiatii, Par. vi. 39.
Curio, H. xxviii. 97.
Cynthia, Purg. xxix. 77.
Cyprian, H. xxviii. 78. Par. viii. 3.
Cyrrhsean, Par. i. 35.
Cyrus, Purg. xii. 51.
Cytherea, Purg. xxv. 127 ; xxviii. 63.

Daedalus, H. xvii. 108; xxix. 112.

Par. viii. 131.
Damiano, Pietro, Par. xxi. 112.
Damiata, H. xiv. 100.
Daniel, Purg. xxii. 143. Par. iv. 13 ;

xxix. 140.
Daniel, Arnault, Purg. xxvi. 134.
Dante, Purg. xxx. 53.
Danube, //. xxxii. 26. Par. viii. 69.
Daphne, Purg. xxii. 112.

Dati de\ Bonturo, II. xxi. 40.

David, II. iv. 55 ; xxviii. 133. Purg.
x. 60. Par. xx. 34; xxv. 71 ;

. xxxii. 8.

Decii, Par. vi. 48.

Dei'anira, //. xii. 65.

Deidamia, //. xxvi. 64. Purg. xxii.
111.

Dei'phile, Purg. xxii. 108.

Delos, Purg. xx. 126.

Delphic, Par. i. 30.

Democritus, //. iv. 132.

Demophoon, Par. ix. 97-

Dente del, Vitaliano, II. xvii. 66.

Diana, Purg. xx. 127 ; xxv. 126.

Diana, a subterraneous stream ima-
gined at Sienna, Purg. xiii. 144.

Dido, H. v. 84. Par. viii. 11 ; ix. 93.

Diogenes, H. iv. 133.

Diomede, H. xxvi. 56.

Dione, Par. viii. 9 ; xxii. 140.

Dionysius the Areopagite, Par. x.

112 ; xxviii. 121.

Dionysius, king of Portugal, Par. xix.

135.
Dionysius the tyrant, H. xii. 107.
Dioscondes, H. iv. 136.
Dis, H. viii. 66 ; xi. 68 ; xii. 37 ;

xxxiv. 20.
Dolcino, H. xxviii. 53.
Dominic, Saint, Par. x. 91 ; xi. 36,

113 ; xii. 51, 64, 134.
Dominicans, Par. xi. 116.
Domitian, Purg. xxii. 83.

Donati, Buoso, H. xxv. 131 ; xxx. 44.
Donati, Cianfa, II. xxv. 39.
Donati, Corso, Purg. xxiv. 81.
Donati, Ubertino, Par. xvi. 118.
Donatus, Par. xii. 129.
Doria, Branca, E. xxxiii. 136, 138.
Douay, Purg. xx. 46.
Draghinazzo, H. xxi. 119 ; xxii. 72.
Duca del, Guido ; da Brettinoro, Purg.

xiv. 83.
Duera da, Buoso, H. xxxii. 113.
Dyrrachium, Par. vi. 66.

Ebro, in Italy, Par. ix. 85.

Ebro, in Spain, Purg. xxvii. 4.

Echo, Par. xii. 12.

Edward I. king of England, Purg.
vii. 133. Par. xix. 121.

Egidius, Par. xi. 76.

Egypt, Purg. ii. 45. Par. xxv. 59.

El, Par. xxvi. 133.

Elbe, Purg. vii. 96, twice.

Eleanor, wife of Edward I. of Eng-
land, Par. vi. 135.

Electra, H. iv. 117.

488

INDEX.

Eli, Purg. xxiii. 69. Par. xxvi. 134.

Elias, Purg. xxxii. 79.

Elijah, H. xxvi. 37.

Eliseo, Par. xv. 129.

Elisha, 11. xxvi. 35.

Elsa, Purg. xxxiii. 67.

Elysian, Par. xv. 25.

Ema, Par. xvi. 142.

Empedocles, H. iv. 134.

England, Purg. vii. 129.

English, Par. xix. 121.

Eolus, Purg. xxviii. 21.

Ephialtes, H. xxxi. 85, 99.

Epicurus, H. x. 15.

Epirot, Par. vi. 44.

Erictho, H. ix. 24.

Eriphyle, Purg. xii. 46. Par. iv. 102

Erisicthon, Purg. xxiii. 23.

Erynnis, H. ix. 46.

Erythraean, H. xxiv. 88.

Esau, Par. via. 136.

Este, Par^r. v. 77.

Este da, Azzo, Purg. v. 77.

Este da, Obizzo, H. xii. Ill ; xviii. 56.

Esther, Purg. xvii. 29.

Eteocles, //. xxvi. 55. Purg. xxii. 57.

Ethiopia, H. xxiv. 87.

Euclid, H. iv. 139.

Eve, Purg. viii. 98 ; xii. 65 ; xxiv.

116. Par. xiii. 35 ; xxxii. 3.
Eunoe, Purg. xxviii. 137 ; xxxiii. 126.
Euphrates, Purg. xxxiii. 112.
Euripides, Purg. xxii. 105.
Europa, Par. xxvii. 78.
Europe, Purg. viii. 121. Par. vi. 6 ;

xii. 44.
Eurus, Par. viii. 71.
Euryalus, //. i. 105.
Eurypilns, H. xx. 111.
Ezekiel, Purg. xxix. 96.

Fabii, Par. vi. 48.

Fabricius, Purg. xx. 25.

Faenza, II. xxvii. 46 ; xxxii. 120.

Purg. xiv. 103.
Falterona, mountain, Purg. xiv. 19.
Falterona, valley, H. xxxii. 53.
Famagosta, Par. xix. 143.
Fano, H. xxviii. 72. Purg. v. 70.
Fantolini, Purg. xiv. 125.
Farfarello, H. xxi. 121 ; xxii. 93.
Farinata. See Uberti.
Felice Guzman, Par. xii. 73.
Feltro, H. i. 102. Par. ix. 50.
Ferdinand IV. of Spain, Par. xix.

122.
Ferrara, Par. ix. 54 ; xv. 130.
Fesole, H. xv. 62, 73. Par. vi. 54 ;

xv. 119 ; xvi. 121.

Fieschi, Purg. xix. 97.

Fifanti degli, Arrigo, //. vi. 81.

Fighine, Par. xvi. 48.

Filippeschi, Purg. vi. 108.

Filippi, Par. xvi. 86.

Filippo. See Argenti.

Flaccus, H. iv. 84.

Flemings, H. xv. 4.

Florence, H. x. 91 ; xvi. 73 ; xxiv.

143 ; xxvi. 1. Purg. vi. 129 ; xi.

114 ; xii. 96 ; xiv. 53 ; xx. 74 ; xxiii.

94. Par. xv. 92 ; xvi. 23, 83, 145,

147 ; xvii. 48 ; xxix. 109 ; xxxi. 35.
Florentine, H. viii. 60 ; xvii. 67 ;

xxxiii. 12. Par. xvi. 59, 85.
Focaccia. See Cancellieri.
Focara, H. xxviii. 85.
Folco, Par. ix. 90.

Forese, Purg. xxiii. 44, 70 ; xxiv. 72.
Forli, H. xvi. 99 ; xxvii. 41. Purg.

xxiv. 33.
Fosco di, Bernardin, Purg. xiv. 103.
France, H. xxvii. 42 ; xxix. 118.

Purg. xx. 49, 69. Par. xv. 114.
Francesca, daughter of Guido Novello

da Polenta, 11. v. 113.
Francis, Saint, H. xxvii. 65, 109. Par.

xi. 34, 69 ; xiii. 30 ; xxii. 88 ; xxxii.

30.
Franco of Bologna, Purg. xi. 83.
Frederick I. Emperor, Purg. xviii.

119.
Frederick II. Emperor, //. x. 120 ;

xiii. 61 ; xxiii. 66. Purg. xvi. 120.

Par. iii. 122.
Frederick II. king of Sicily, Purg. iii.

113. Par. xix. 127 ; xx. 58.
Frenchman, H. xxxii. 112.
Friezelanders, II. xxxi. 57.
Fucci, Vanni, H. xxiv. 120.

Gabriel, Par. iv. 48 ; ix. 133 ; xxxii

91, 101.
Gaddo, son of Count Ugolino de:

Gherardeschi, //. xxxiii. 66.
Gades, Par. xxvii. 76.
Gaeta, Par. viii. 64.
Gaia, Purg. xvi. 144.
Galenus, H. iv. 140.
Galicia, Par. xxv. 20.
Galigaio, Par. xvi. 98.
Galli, Par. xvi. 102.
Gallia, Purg. vii. 108.
Gallura, II. xxii. 81. Purg. viii. 81.
Galluzzo, Par. xvi. 51.
Ganellon, II. xxxii. 119,
Ganges, Purg. ii. 5 ; xxvii. 5. Par.

xi. 48.
Ganymede, Purg. ix. 21.

INDEX.

489

Garda, //. xx. 62.

Gardingo, //. xxiii. 110.

Gascou, Par. xvii. 80 ; xxvii. 53.

Gascony, Purg. xx. 64.

Gaville, //. xxv. 140.

Genoan, Par. ix. 87.

Genoese, //. xxxiii. 149.

Gentiles, Par. xx. 96.

Gentucca, Purg. xxiv. 38.

Geri. See Bello.

German, //. xvii. 21. Purg. vi. 98.

Par. viii. 70.
Germany, H. xx. 59.
Geryon, //. xvii. 93, 129; xviii. 21.

Purg. xxvii. 24.
Ghent, H. xv. 5. Purg. xx. 46.
Gherardeschi de', Ugolino, Count, II.

xxxiii. 14, 86.
Gherardo. See Camino.
Ghibellines, Par. vi. 107.
Ghino di Tacco, Purg. vi. 15.
Ghisola, //. xviii. 55.
Giacomo. See Andrea da, Sant'
Giacopo. See RusticuccL
Gianiigliazzi, //. xvii. 57.
Gibraltar, II. xxvi. 106.
Gideon, Purg. xxiv. 124.
Gilboa, Purg. xii. 37.
Giotto, Purg. xi. 95.
Giovanna, mother of Saint Dominic,

Par. xii. 74.
Giovanna, wife of Buonconte da Monte-

feltro, Purg. v. 88.
Giovanna, wife of Riccardo da Camino,

Purg. viii. 71.
Giuda, Par. xvi. 121.
Giuliano, S., H. xxxiii. 29.
Giuochi, Par. xvi 102.
Glaucus, Par. i. 66.
Godfrey of Boulogne, Par. xviii. 43.
Gomita, Friar, H. xxii. 80.
Gomorrah, Purg. xxvi. 35.
Gorgon, //. ix. 57.
Gorgona, U. xxxiii. 82.
Governo, H. xx. 77.
Graecia, II. xx. 107. Par. xx. 51.
Gralhacane, II. xxi. 120 ; xxii. 34.
Gratian, Par. x. 101.
Greci, Par. xvi. 87.
Grecian, Purg. xxii. 106.
Greek, Purg. xxii. 100.
Greeks, II. xxvi. 76. Purg. xxii. 87.
Gregory the Great, Purg. x. 68. Par.

xx. 103 ; xxviii. 126.
Grifolino d'Arezzo, II. xxix. 104 ; xxx.

32.
Gualandi, II. xxxiii. 32.
Gualdo, Par. xi. 44.
Gualdrada, II. xvi. 38.

Gualterotti, Par. xvi. 132.

Guelphs, Par. vi. 110.

Guenever, Par. xvi. 15.

Guido. See Cassero, Castello, Caval-

canti, Duca, Guinicelli, Novello,

Prata.
Guido, Conte, Par. xvi. 95.
Guido of Romena, //. xxx. 76.
Guidoguerra, If. xvi. 38.
Guinicelli, Guido, Purg. xi. 96 ; xxvi.

83.
Guiscard, Robert, II. xxviii. 12. Par.

xviii. 44.
Guittone d'Arezzo, Purg. xxiv. 56 ;

xxvi. 118.

Haman, Purg. xvii. 26.

Hannibal, H. xxxi. 107. Par. vi. 51.

Haquin, Par. xix. 136.

Hautefort, //. xxix. 28.

Hebrews, Purg. xxiv. 123. Par. xxxii.

14.
Hector, H. iv. 118. Par. vi. 71.
Hecuba, //. xxx. 16.
Helen, //. v. 63.
Helice, Par. xxxi. 29.
Helicon, Purg. xxix. 38.
Heliodorus, Purg. xx. 111.
Hellespont, Purg. xxviii. 70.
Henry, nephew of Henry III. of

England, H. xii. 119.
Henry of Navarre. Purg. vii. 105.
Henry II. king of Cyprus, Par. xix.

144.
Henry II. king of England, II. xxviii.

131.
Henry III. king of England, Purg.

vii. 131.
Henry VI. Emperor, Par. iii. 122.
Henry VII. Emperor, Purg. vi. 103.

Par. xvii. 80 ; xxx. 135.
Heraclitus, H. iv. 134.
Hercules, H. xxvi. 106. Par. ix. 98.
Hesperian, Purg. xxvii. 4.
Hezekiah, Par. xx. 44.
Hippocrates, H. iv. 139. Purg. xxix.

133.
Hippolytus, Par. xvii. 47.
Holofernes, Purg. xii. 54.
Homer, //. iv. 83. Purg. xxii. 100.
Honorius III. Par. xi. 90.
Horace. See Flaccus.
Horatii, Par. vi. 39.
Hugh. See Capet.
Hugues. See Victor Saint.
Hungary, Par. viii. 68 ; xix. 138.
Hyperion, Par. xxii. 138.
Hypsipile, //. xviii. 90. Purg. xxii.

110.

490

INDEX.

Jacob, Par. viii. 136 ; xxii. 70.
James, king of Majorca and Minorca,

Par. xix. 133.
James, Saint ; the elder, Par. xxv. 20.
James II. king of Arragon, Pwrg. iii.

113 ; vii. 120. Par. xix. 133. .
January, Par. xxvii. 133.
Janus, Par. vi. 83.
Jarbas, Purg. xxxi. 69.
Jason, the Argonaut, II. xviii. 85.

Par. ii. 19.
Jason, the Jew, II. xix. 88.
Iberia, II. xxvi. 101.
Icarus, II. xvii. 105. Par. viii. 132.
Ida, II. xiv. 93.
Jephthah, Par. v. 64.
Jerome, Saint, Par. xxix. 38. .
Jerusalem, Purg. xxiii. 26. Par.

xix. 125 ; xxv. 59.
Jesus. See Christ.
Jews, II. xxiii. 126 ; xxvii. 83. Par.

v. 81 ; vii. 45 ; xxix. 108.
Ilerda, Purg. xviii. 100.
Ilion, Purg. xii. 57.
Ilium, II. i. 71.
Illuminato, Par. xii. 121.
Imola, H. xxvii. 46.
Importuni, Par. xvi. 133.
Indian, Purg. xxvi. 18 ; xxxii. 41.

Par. xxix. 108.
Indus, Par. xix. 67.
Infangato, Par. xvi. 122.
Innocent III. Par. xi. 85.
Ino, //. xxx. 5.

Interminei, Alessio, II. xviii. 120.
Joachim, Par. xii. 131.
Joanna, Par. xii. 74.
Jocasta, Purg. xxii. 57.
John the Baptist, H. xiii. 145 ; xxx.

73. Purg. xxii. 148. Par. iv. 29 ;

xvi. 24, 45 ; xviii. 130 ; xxxii. 26.
John, king of England, H. xxviii. 130.
John, Saint, the Evangelist, II. xix.

109. Purg. xxix. 101. Par. iv.

29 ; xxiv. 124 ; xxv. 94, 112 ; xxvi.

51 ; xxxii. 112.
John XXI. See Peter of Spain.
John XXII. Par. xxvii. 53.
Iole, Par. ix. 98.
Jordan, Purg. xviii. 134. Par. xxii.

91.
Josaphat, H. x. 12.
Joseph, H. xxx. 96.
Joshua, Purg. xx. 108. Par. ix. 122 ;

xviii. 34.
Jove, H. xiv. 48 ; xxxi. 39, 83. Purg.

xxix. 116 ; xxxii. 110. Par. iv. 63 ;

vi. 6 ; ix. 98 ; xviii. 65 ; xxii. 141 ;

xxvii. 13.

Iphigenia, Par. v. 70.

Iris, Purg. xxi. 49. Par. xii. 9.

Isaias, Par. xxv. 90.

Isere, Par. vi. 60.

Isidore, Par. x. 126.

Ismene, Purg. xxii. 110.

Ismenus, Purg. xviii. 92.

Israel, H. iv. 56. Purg. ii. -if).

Israelites, Par. v. 48.

Italian, H. xxxiii. 79. Purg. vi. 126.

Par. ix. 26.
Italy, H. i. 103 ; ix. 113 ; xx. 57.

Purg. vi. 76 ; vii. 95 ; xiii. 87 ; xx.

65 ; xxx. 89. Par. xxi. 90 ; xxx.

136.
Juba, Par. vi. 73.
Judas, H. ix. 28 ; xxxi. 134 ; xxxiv.

58. Purg. xx. 72 ; xxi. 85.
Judecca, II. xxxiv. 112.
Judith, Par. xxxii. 7.
Julia, H. iv. 125.
Julius. See Caesar.
July, "H. xxix. 46.
Juno, H. xxx. 1. Par. xii. 9 ; xxviii.

29.
Jupiter. See Jove.
Justinian, Par. vi. 11.
Juvenal, Purg. xxii. 14.

Lacedaemon, Purg. vi. 141.

Lachesis, Purg. xxi. 25 ; xxv. 81.

Laertes, Par. xxvii. 77.

Lamberti, Par. xvi. 109.

Lambertuccio, Purg. xiv. 102.

Lamone, //. xxvii. 46.

Lancelot, II. v. 124.

Lanciotto, H. v. 106.

Lanfranchi, H. xxxiii. 32.

Langia, Purg. xxii. 110.

Lano, H. xiii. 122.

Lapi, Par. xxix. 111.

Lateran, II. xxvii. 82. Par. xxxi. 32.

Latian, H. xxii. 64 ; xxvii. 31 ; xxviii.

68 ; xxix. 85, 88.
Latini, Brunetto, H. xv. 28, 102.
Latinus, H. iv. 122.
Latium, H. xxvii. 24 ; xxix. 88. Purg.

vii. 15 ; xi. 58 ; xiii. 85.
Latoua, Purg. xx. 126. Par. x. 64 ;

xxii. 135 ; xxix. 1.
Lavagno, Purg. xix. 98.
Lavinia, H. iv. 123. Purg. xvii. 37.

Par. vi. 4.
Laurence, Saint, Par. iv. 82.
Leah, Purg. xxvii. 102.
Leander, Purg. xxviii. 72.
Learchus, H. xxx. 10.
Leda, Purg. iv. 59. Par. xxvii. 93.
Lemnian, H. xviii. 86.

INDEX.

491

Lentino da, Jacopo, Purr/, xxiv. 56.

Leriee, Pwrg. iii. 49.

Lethe, //. xiv. 126, 131. Pwrg. x.wi.

101; xxviii. 137; xxx. 145; xxxiii.

94, 123.
Levi, Pwrg. xvi. 136.
Liandolo di, Loderingo, II. xxiii. 106.
Libaims, Pvrg. xxx. 12.
Libieocco, II. xxi. 119 J xxii. 69.
Libra, Pwrg. xxvii. 3. Par. xxix. 2.
Lille, Pwrg. xx. 46.
Limbo, II. iv. 41.
Limoges, Purg. xxvi. 113.
Linus, Poet, II. iv. 138.
Linus, Pope, Par. xxvii. 37.
Livy, //. xxviii. 10.
Lizio. See Valbona.
Loderingo. See Liandolo.
Logodoro, H. xxii. 88.
Loire, Par. vi. 61.
Lombard, //. i. 64 ; xxii. 98 ; xxvii.

17. Purg. vi. 62 ; xvi. 128. Par.

vi. 96 ; xvii. 69.
Lombardo. See Pietro.
Lombardo, Marco, Purg. xvi. 46, 133.
Lombardy, //. xxviii. 70. Purg. xvi.

46, 117.
Louis, Purg. xx. 49.
Lucan, H. iv. 85 ; xxv. 85.
Lucca, H. xxxiii. 30. Purg. xxiv.

21, 36.
Lucia, //. ii. 97, 100. Pwrg. ix. 51.

Par. xxxii. 123.
Lucifer, H. xxxi. 134 ; xxxiv. 82.
Lucretia, H. iv. 124. Par. vi. 41.
Luke, Purg. xxi. 6 ; xxix. 131.
Luni, //. xx. 44. Par. xvi. 72.
Lybia, H. xxiv. 83.
Lybic, Purg. xxvi. 39.
Lycurgus, Purg. xxvi. 87.

Macarius, Par. xxii. 48.

Maccabee, Par. xviii. 37.

Maccabees, //. xix. 89.

Machinardo. See Pagano.

Macra, Par. ix. 86.

Madian, Purg. xxiv. 125.

Maia, Par. xxii. 140.

Malacoda, H. xxi. 74, 77.

Malaspina, Conrad, Purg. viii. 65,

117.
Malatestino. See Rimini.
Malavolti de', Catalano, //. xxiii. 105,

116.
Malebolge, H. xviii. 2 ; xxi. 5 ; xxiv.

37 ; xxix. 39.
Malta, Par. ix. 53.
Manardi, Arrigo, Purg. xiv. 100.
Manfredi, Purg. iii. 110.

Manfredi de' Alberigo, //. xxxiii.

116, 152.
Manfredi de' Tribaldello, //. xxxii.

119.
Mangiadore, Pietro, Par. xii. 125.
Manto, II. xx. 50.
Mantua, //. ii. 59 ; xx. 91. /

vi. 72 ; xviii. 84.
Mantuan, //. i. 64. Purg. vi. 74 ; vii.86,
Marca d'Ancona, Purg. v. 67.
Marcellus, Purg. vi. 127.
Marcia, II. iv. 125. Purg. i. 79, 85.
Marco. See Lombardo.
Mareinma, II. xxv. 18 ; xxix. 47.

Purg. v. 132.
Margaret, wife of Louis IX. of France,

Purg. vii. 129. Par. vi. 135.
Marocco, II. xxvi. 102.
Mars, H. xxiv. 144. Purg. ii. 14 ;

xii. 27. Par. iv. 64; viii. 138;

xiv. 93 ; xvi. 45 ; xxvii. 13.
Marseilles, Purg. xviii. 100.
Marsyas, Par. i. 19.
Martin, Par. xiii. 135.
Martin IV., Purg. xxiv. 23.
Mary, Purg. xxiii. 26.
Mary, the blessed Virgin, Purg. iii.

37 ; v. 98 ; viii. 37 ; xv. 87 ; xviii.

98 ; xxii. 139 ; xxxiii. 6. Par. iv.

30 ; xi. 67 ; xiv. 33 ; xv. 125 ; xxiii.

71, 109, 122, 132 ; xxv. 127 ; xxxi.

124 ; xxxii. 3, 4, 95, 101 ; xxxiii. 1.
Mary of Brabant, Purg. vi. 24.
Marzucco. See Scornigiani.
Mascheroni, Sassol, H. xxxii. 63.
Matilda, Purg. xxviii. 41 ; xxxii. 82 ;

xxxiii. 119.
Matteo, Par. xii. 111.
Matthias, Saint, H. xix. 98.
Medea, H. xviii. 94.
Medicina da, Piero, H. xxviii. 69.
Medusa, H. ix. 53.
Megsera, H. ix. 47.
Melchisedec, Par. viii. 130.
Meleager, Purg. xxv. 22.
Melissus, Par. xiii. 121.
Menalippus, H. xxxii. 128.
Mercabo, H. xxviii. 71.
Mercury, Par. iv. 64.
Metellus, Purg. ix. 130.
Michael, the Archangel, Par. iv. 48.
Michel. See Zanche.
Mieliol, Purg. x. 63, 65.
Midas, Purg. xx. 105.
Milan, Purg. viii. 80; xviii. 120.
Mincius, II. xx. 76.
Minerva, Purg. xxx. 67. Par. ii. 8.
Minos, II. v. 4, 20 ; xiii. 99 ; xx. 33 ;

xxvii. 120; xxix. 114. Purg. i. 77.

492

INDEX.

Minotaur, H. xii. 25.
Mira, Purg. v. 79.
Modena, Par. vi. 78.
Mohammed, II. xxviii. 31, 58.
Moldaw, Purg. vii. 99.
Monaldi, Purg. vi. 108.
Mongibello, H. xiv. 53.
Montagna. See Parcitati.
Montagues, Purg. vi. 107.
Montaperto, H. xxxii. 81.
Montefeltro, Purg. v. 87.
Montefeltro da, Guido, II. xxvii. 04.
Montemalo, Par. xv. 103.
Montemurlo, Par. xvi. 63.
Montereggion, II. xxxi. 36.
Montferrat, Purg. vii. 138.
Montfort de, Guy, H. xii. 119 ; xxxii.

112.
Montone, H. xvi. 94.
Mordecai, Purg. xvii. 29.
Mordrec, II. xxxii. 59.
Moronto, Par. xv. 129.
Mosca. See Uberti.
Moses, //. iv. 54. Purg. xxxii. 79.

Par. iv. 29 ; xxiv. 135 ; xxvi. 39 ;

xxxii. 116.
Mozzi de', Andrea, //. xv. 113.
Mulciber, //. xiv. 54.
Mutius. See Scoevola.
Myrrha, //. xxx. 39.

Naiads, Purg. xxxiii. 50.

Naples, Purg. iii. 26.

Narcissus, //. xxx. 128. Par. iii. 17.

Nasidius, //. xxv. 87.

Naso, H. iv. 85. See Ovid.

Nathan, Par. xii. 127.

Navarre, II. xxii. 47, 121. Purg. xx.

64. Par. xix. 140.
Nazareth, Par. ix. 133.
Nebuchadnezzar, Par. iv. 13.
Nella, Purg. xxiii. 80.
Neptune, II. xxviii. 79. Par. xxxiii.

91.
Neri, H. xxiv. 142.
Nerli, Par. xv. 110.
Nessus, //. xii. 96 ; xiii. 1.
Niccolo. See Salimbeni.
Nicholas, Saint, Purg. xx. 30.
Nicholas III. H. xix. 71.
Nicosia, Par. xix. 144.
Nile, //. xxxiv. 41. Purg. xxiv. 63.

Par. vi. 68.
Nimrod, H. xxxi. 70. Purg. xii. 29.

Par. xxvi. 125.
Nino. See Visconti.
Ninus, H. v. 5*8.
Niobe, Purg. xii. 33.
Nisus, //. u 105.

Noah, II. iv. 53. Par. xii. 15.
Nocera, Par. xi. 44.
Noli, Purg. iv. 24.
Nona della, Vanni, H. xxiv. 120.
Norman, //. xxviii. 12.
Normandy, Purg. xx. 64.
Norway, Par. xix. 136.
Novara, H. xxviii. 56.
Novello, Frederic. See Battifolle.
Novello, Guido ; da Polenta, //.
xxvii. 38.

Obizzo. See Este.

Octavius. See Caesar, Augustus.

Oderigi. See Agobbio.

Olympus, Purg. xxiv. 16.

Omberto, Purg. xi. 67.

Ordelaffi, or Ardelaffi, Sinibaldo, //.

xxvii. 41.
Orestes, Purg. xiii. 29.
Oriaco, Purg. v. 80.
Orlando, H. xxxi. 14. Par. xviii. 40.
Ormanni, Par. xvi. 87.
Orosius, Paulus, Par. x. 116.
Orpheus, H. iv. 137.
Orsini, H. xix. 72.
Orso, Count, Purg. vi. 20.
Ostiense, Par. xii. 77.
Ottaviano. See Ubaldini.
Ottocar, Purg. vii. 100.
Ovid, H. xxv. 87. See Naso.

Pachynian, Par. viii. 72.

Padua, Par. ix. 46.

Paduan, H. xvii. 67.

Paduans, H. xv. 7.

Paean, Par. xiii. 22.

Pagani, Purg. xiv. 121.

Pagano, Machinardo, //. xxvii. 47.

Purg. xiv. 122.
Palazzo da, Conrad, Purg. xvi. 126.
Palermo, Par. viii. 79.
Palladium, H. xxvi. 66.
Pallas, son of Evander, Par vi. 34.
Pallas, Minerva, Purg. xii. 27.
Paolo, H. v. 131.

Parcitati de', Montagna, H. xxvii. 44.
Paris, city, Purg. xi. 81 ; xx. 51.
Paris, son of Priam, H. v. 66.
Parmenides, Par. xiii. 120.
Parnassian, Purg. xxii. 65 ; xxviii.

147.
Parnassus, Par. i. 15.
Pasiphae, H. xii. 14. Purg. xxvi. 33,

78.
Paul, Saint, H. ii. 34. Purg. xxix.

135. Par. xviii. 128, 132 ; xxi. 119 ;

xxviii. 130.

INDEX.

403

Pazzi, Carlino, //. xxxii. 66.

Pazzo, Riniero, //. xii. 138.

Pegassean, Par. xviii. 76.

Peleus, H. xxxi. 4. Purg. xxii. 113.

Pelorus, Purg. xiv. 34. Par. viii. 72.

Peneian, Par. i. 31.

Penelope, II. xxvi. 95.

Penestrino, II. xxvii. 98.

Penthesilea, II. iv. 121.

Pera, Par. xvi. 124.

Perillus, //. xxvii. 7.

Persians, Par. xix. 111.

Persius, Purg. xxii. 99.

Perugia, Par. vi. 77 ; xi. 43.

Peschiera, H. xx. 69.

Peter, Saint, H. i. 130 ; ii. 26 ; xviii.

34 ; xix. 94, 97 ; xxxi. 54. Purg.

ix. 119 ; xix. 97. Par. ix. 136 ; xi.

112 ; xviii. 128, 132 ; xxi. 118 ; xxii.

86 ; xxiii. 133 ; xxiv. 35 ; xxv. 14 ;

xxvii. 11 ; xxxii. 110, 118.
Peter of Spain, Par. xii. 126.
Peter III. of Spain, Purg. vii. 113,

126.
Pettinagno, Piero, Purg. xiii. 119.
Phaedra, Par. xvii. 46.
Phaeton, H. xvii. 102. Purg. iv. C8.

Par. xvii. 1 ; xxxi. 116.
Pharisees, H. xxiii. 118 ; xxvii. 81.
Pharsalia, Par. vi. 67.
Philip III. of France, Purr/, vii. 104
Philip IV. of France. H. xix. 91.

Purg. vii. Ill ; xx. 85. Par. xix. 117.
Philips, Purg. xx. 49.
Phlegethon, H. xiv. Ill, 126.
Phlegraean, //. xiv. 55.
Phlegyas, //. viii. 18, 23.
Phoebus, H. xxvi. 115.
Phoenicia, Par. xxvii. 78.
Pholus, //. xii. 69.
Photinus, II. xi. 9.
Phrygian, Purg. xx. 113.
Phyllis, Par. ix. 96.
Pia, Purg. v. 131.
Piava, Par. ix. 28.
Piccarda, Purg. xxiv. 11. Par. iii.

50 ; iv. 94, 108.
Piceno, H. xxiv. 147.
Pierian, Purg. xxxi. 141.
Pietra della, Nello, Purg. v. 133.
Pietrapana, H. xxxii. 29.
Pietro. See Mangiadore.
Pietro Lombardo, Par. x. 104.
Pigli, Par. xvi. 100.
Pilate, Purg. xx. 91.
Pinamonte. See Buonacossi.
Pisa, II. xxxiii. 30, 77. Purg. vi. 18.
Pisans, Purg. xiv. 55.
Pisces, H. xi. 118. Purg. i. 21.

Pisistratus, Purg. xv. 95.

Pistoia, II. xxiv. 124, 142 ; xxv. 9.

Pius I. Par. xxvii. 40.

Plato, //. iv. 131. Purg. iii. 41. Par.

iv. 24.
Plautus, Purg. xxii. 97.
Plutus, //. vi. 117 ; vii. 2.
Po, //. v. 97 ; xx. 77. Purg. xiv. 95 ;

xvi. 117. Par. vi. 52.
Poitou, Purg. xx. 64.
Pola, //. ix. 112.

Polenta, //. xxvii. 38. See Novello.
Polycletus, Purg. x. 30.
Polvdorus, H. xxx. 19. Purn. xx.

113. J

Polyhymnia, Par. xxiii. 55.
Polymnestor, Purg. xx. 112.
Polynices, II. xxvi. 55. Purq. xxii.

57.
Polyxena, H. xxx. 18.
Pompeian^ Par. vi. 74.
Pompey, Par. vi. 54.
Ponthieu, Purg. xx. 64.
Portugal, Par. xix. 135.
Pouille, Purg. vii. 127.
Prague, Par. xix. 116.
Prata of, Guido, Purg. xiv. 107
Prato, H. xxvi. 9.
Pratomagno, Purg. v. 115.
Pressa, Par. xvi. 98.
Priam, H. xxx. 15.
Priscian, H. xv. 110.
Proserpine, Purg. xxviii. 51.
Provencals, Par. vi. 132.
Provence, Purg. vii. 127 ; xx. 59. Par.

viii. 60.
Provenzano. See Salvani.
Ptolemy, H. iv. 139.
Ptolemy, king of Egypt, Par. vi. 71.
Ptolomea, H. xxxiii. 123.
Pygmalion, Purg. xx. 103.
Pyramus, Purg. xxvii. 38 ; xxxiii. 69.
Pyrrhus, II. xii. 135. Par. vi. 44.

Quarnaro, H. ix. 112.

Quintius Cincinnatus, Par. vi. 47 ;

xv. 122.
Quirinus, Par. viii. 137.

Raban, Par. xii. 130.

Rachel, //. ii. 102 ; iv. 57. Purg.

xxvii. 105. Par. xxxii. 6.
Rahab, Par. ix. 112.
Raphael, Par. iv. 48.
Ratza, Par. xix. 137.
Ravenna, H. xxvii. 37. Par. vi. 63.
Ravignani, Par. xvi. 60.
Raymond, See Berenger.
Rebecca, Par. xxxii. 7.

494

INDEX.

Rehoboam, Purg. xii. 12.

Renard, Par. xviii. 43.

Reno, H. xviii. 61. Purg. xiv. 95.

Rhea, if. xiv. 95.

Rhine, Par. vi. 60.

Rhodope, Par. ix. 96.

Rhone, 77. ix. 111. Par. vi. 62 ; viii.

61.
Rialto, Par. ix. 27.
Richard. See Victor Saint.
Rigogliosi, Marchese de', Purg. xxiv.

32.
Rimini, Malatestino da, 77. xxviii.

81.
Rinieri. See Calboli, Corneto, Pazzo.
Riphsean, Purg. xxvi. 38.
Ripheus, Par. xx. 62.
Robert, Purg. xx. 57.
Robert, king of Sicily, Par. viii. 81.
Robert. See Guiscard.
Rudolph, Emperor, Purg. vi. 104 ; vii.

94. Par. viii. 77.
Romagna, 77. xxvii. 25, 34 ; xxxiii.

152. Purg. v. 68 ; xiv. 101 ; xv.

43.
Roman, Purg. x. 67 ; xxxii. 101. Par.

vi. 43.
Romano, Par. ix. 29.
Romano di, Azzolino, 77. xii. 110.

Par. ix. 30.
Romans, 77. xv. 77 ; xviii. 29. Par.

xix. 98.
Rome, II. i. 66 ; ii. 22 ; xiv. 100 ;

xxvi. 62 ; xxviii. 10. Purg. vi. 114;

xvi. 109, 129 ; xviii. 80 ; xix. 107 ;

xxi. 89 ; xxii. 143 ; xxix. Ill ;

xxxii. 101. Par. vi. 59; ix. 135;

xv. 119 ; xvi. 10 ; xxiv. 64 ; xxvii.

57 ; xxxi. 31.
Romena, 77. xxx. 72.
Romeo, Par. vi. 131, 137.
Romoaldo, Saint, Par. xxii. 48.
Romulus. See Quirinus.
Rubaconte, Purg. xii. 95.
Rubicant, II. xxi. 121 ; xxii. 40.
Rubicon, Par. vi. 64.
Ruggieri. See Ubaldini.
Rusticucci, Giacopo, 77. vi. 80 ; xvi.

45.
Ruth, Par. xxxii. 7.

Sabellius, Par. xiii. 123.
Sabellus, II. xxv. 86.
Sabines, Par. vi. 41.
Sacchetti, Par. xvi. 101.
Saladin. See Soldan.
Salem, Purg. ii. 3.
Salimbeni, Niccolo, 77. xxix. 123.
Salterello, Lapo, Par. xv. 120.

Salvani, Provenzano, Purg. xi. 122.

Samaria, Purg. xxi. 2.

Samuel, Par. iv. 29.

Sancha, wife of Richard, king of the

Romans, Par. vi. 135.
Sanleo, Purg. iv. 23.
Sannella, Par. xvi. 89.
Santafiore, Purg. vi. 113.
Santerno, 77. xxvii. 46.
Sapia, Purg. xiii. 101.
Sapphira, Purg. xx. 109.
Saracens, 77. xxvii. 83. Purg. xxiii.

97.
Sarah, Par. xxxii. 6.
Sardanapalus, Par. xv. 102.
Sardinia, H. xxii. 89 ; xxix. 47. Purg.

xviii. 81 ; xxiii. 87.
Sardinian, 77. xxvi. 103.
Satan, II. vii. 1.
Saturn, 77. xiv. 95. Purg. xix. 4.

Par. xxi. 24.
Savena, H. xviii. 61.
Savio, 77. xxvii. 50.
Saul, Purg. xii. 35.
Scaevola, Mutius, Par. iv. 82.
Scala della, Alboino, Par. xvii. 69.
Scala della, Bartolommeo, Par. xvii.

69.
Scala della, Can Grande, II. i. 98.

Par. xvii. 75.
Scarmiglione, 77. xxi. 103.
Schicchi, Gianni, 77. xxx. 33.
Sciancato, Puccio, //. xxv. 138.
Scipio, 77. xxxi. 106. Purg. xxix.

112. Par. vi. 54 ; xxvii. 57.
Sclavonian, Purg. xxx. 88.
Scornigiani de', Farinata, Purg. vi.

18.
Scornigiani, Marzucco, Purg. vi. 19.
Scorpion, Purg. xxv. 4.
Scot, Par. xix. 121.
Scot, Michael, 77. xx. 114.
Scrovigni, 77. xvii. 62.
Scyros, Purg. ix. 35.
Seine, Par. vi. 61 ; xix. 118.
Semele, 77. xxx. 2. Par. xxi. 5.
Semiramis, 77. v. 57.
Seneca, 77. iv. 138.
Sennaar, Purg. xii. 32.
Sennacherib, Purg. xii. 48.
September, 77. xxix. 46.
Serchio, 77. xxi. 48.
Sestus, Purg. xxviii. 74.
Seville, 77. xx. 125 ; xxvi. 108.
Sextus Tarquinius, or Sextus Pom-

peius, 77. xii. 135.
Sextus I. Par. xxvii. 40.
Sibyl, Par. xxxiii. 63.
Sichams, 77. v. 61. Par. ix. 94.

INDEX.

495

Sicilian, II. xxvii. 6.

Sicily, II. xii. 108. Purg. iii. 113.

Par. xix. 128.
Sienna, II. xxix. 105, 118. Purg. v.

131 ; xi. 112, 124, 135 ; xiii. 98.
Siennese, //. xxix. 131. Purg. xi. 65.
Siestri, Purg. xix. 99.
Sifanti, Par. xvi. 102.
Sigebert, Par. x. 132.
Signa da, Bonifazio, Par. xvi. 54.
Sile, Par. ix. 48.
Silvias, II. ii. 14.
Simifonte, Par. xvi. 61.
Simois, Par. vi. 70.
Simon Magus, H. xix. 1. Par. xxx.

145.
Simonides, Purg. xxii. 106.
Sinigaglia, Par. xvi. 74.
Sinon, II. xxx. 97, 115.
Sion, Purg. iv. 65.
Sismondi, //. xxxiii. 32.
Sizii, Par. xvi. 106.
Socrates, II. iv. 131.
Sodom, H. xi. 53. Pwr^. xxvi. 35, 72.
Soldan, H. iv. 126 ; v. 59 ; xxvii. 85.

Par. xi. 94.
Soldanieri, Par. xvi. 90.
Soldanieri del, Gianni, //. xxxii. 118.
Solomon, Par. x. 105 ; xiii. 85.
Solon, Par. viii. 129.
Soracte, H. xxvii. 89.
Sordello, Purg. vi. 75 ; vii. 2, 52 ;

viii. 38, 43, 62, 93 ; ix. 53.
Sorga, Par. viii. 61.
Spain, Purg. xviii. 101. Par. vi. 65 ;

xii. 42. See Peter.
Spaniard, Par. xix. 122 ; xxix. 108.
Sphinx, Purg. xxxiii. 47.
Statius, Purg. xxi. 92 ; xxii. 26 ; xxv.

30, 35 ; xxvii. 47 ; xxxii. 28 ; xxxiii.

15, 133.
Stephen, Saint, Purg. xv. 105.
Stricca, H. xxix. 121.
Strophades, H. xiii. 12.
Stygian, H. vii. 110 ; ix. 80.
Styx, H. xiv. 111.
Suabia, Par. iii. 122.
Sylvester, the Franciscan, Par. xi. 76.
Sylvester, Pope, H. xxvii. 90.
Syren, Purg. xix. 18. Par. xii. 7.
Syrinx, Purg. xxxii. 64.

Tabernich, H. xxxii. 29.
Tabor, Purg. xxxii. 73.
Tacco. See Ghino.
Taddeo, Par. xii. 77.
Tagliacozzo, //. xxviii. 16.
Tagliamento, Par. ix. 44.
Tanais, H. xxxii. 27.

Tarlatti do', Cione, or Ciacco, Purg.

vi. 15.
Tarpeian, Purg. ix. 129.
Tarquin the Proud, II. iv. 124.
Tartars, II. xvii. 16.
Taurus, Purg. xxv. 3. Par. xxii.

107.
Tegghiaio. See Aldobrandi.
Telamone, Purg. xiii. 142.
Telemachus, H. xxvi. 93.
Tellus, Purg. xxix. 115.
Terence, Purg. xxii. 96.
Thais, H. xviii. 130.
Thales, //. iv. 135.
Thames, H. xii. 120.
Thaumantian, Purg. xxi. 49.
Theban, //. xiv. 65 ; xxvi. 55 ; xxx. 2.
Thebes, H. xx. 30 ; xxv. 15 ; xxx. 23 ;

xxxii. 11 ; xxxiii. 90. Purg. xviii.

92 ; xxi. 92 ; xxii. 88.
Themis, Purg. xxxiii. 47.
Theseus, II. ix. 55. Purg. xxiv. 122.
Thetis, Purg. xxii. 112.
Thibault, king, H. xxii. 51.
Thisbe, Purg. xxvii. 37.
Thomas, Saint, Par. xvi. 128.
Thomas Saint, Aquinas, Purg. xx.

67. Par. x. 96 ; xii. 103, 133 ; xiii.

29 ; xiv. 6.
Thracia, Purg. xx. 112.
Thymbrrean, Purg. xii. 26.
Tiber, H. xxvii. 28. Purg. ii. 97.

Par. xi. 99.
Tiberius, Par. vi. 89.
Tignoso, Federigo, Purg. xiv. 108.
Tigris, Purg. xxxiii. 112.
Timasus, Par. iv. 50.
Tiresias, H. xx. 37. Purg. xxii. 112.
Tisiphone, H. ix. 48.
Tithonus, Purg. ix. 1.
Titus, Purg. xxi. 83. Par. vi. 94.
Tityus, H. xxxi. 115.
Tobias, Par. iv. 49.
Tolosa, Purg. xxi. 89.
Tomyris, Purg. xii. 51.
Toppo, H. xiii. 123.
Torquatus, Par. vi. 46.
Tosa della. See Cianghella.
Tosinghi, Par. xvi. 103, 110.
Tours, Purg. xxiv. 23.
Trajan, Purg. x. 69. Par. xx. 39.
Traversaro, Purg. xiv. 109.
Traversaro, Piero, Purg. xiv. 100.
Trento, city, H. xii. 5 ; xx. 65.
Trento, river, Par. viii. 65.
Trespiano, Par. xvi. 52.
Tribaldello. See Manfredi.
Trinacria, Par. viii. 73.
Tristan, H. v. 66.

496

INDEX.

Trivia, Par. xxiii. 25.

Trojan, //. xiii. 12 ; xxviii. 8. Par.

xx. 62.
Tronto, river. See Trento.
Troy, II. i. 70 ; xxvi. 65 ; xxx. 14, 23,

97,113. Purg.xii.55. Par. xv. 119.
Tully, H. iv. 138.
Tupino, Par. xi. 40.
Turbia, Purg. iii. 49.
Turks, H. xvii. 16.
Turnus, H. i. 105.
Tuscan, H. xxii. 97 ; xxiii. 76, 92 ;

xxviii. 104 ; xxxii. 63. Purg. xi.

58; xiii. 139; xiv. 105, 128; xvi.

141. Par. ix. 87 ; xxii. 114.
Tuscany, H. xxiv. 121. Purg. xi.

110 ; xiv. 17.
Tydeus, H. xxxii. 128.
Typhosus, Par. viii. 74.
Typhon, H. xxxi. 115.
Tyrol, H. xx. 59.

Valbona di, Lizio, Purg. xiv. 99.
Valdichiana, H. xxix. 45.
Valdigrieve, Par. xvi. 65.
Valdimagra, H. xxiv. 144. Purg. viii.

115.
Valdipado, Par. xv. 130.
Valeri, Sieur de. See Alardo.
Vanni. See Fucci.
Var, Par. vi. 60.
Varro, Purg. xxii. 97.
Vatican, Par. ix. 134.
Ubaldini degli, Ottaviano, //. x. 121.
Ubaldini degli, Kuggieri, II. xxx iii.

15.
Ubaldini degli, Ubaldino ; of Pisa,

Purg. xxiv. 29.
Ubaldini degli, Ugolino ; of Azzo,

Purg. xiv. 107.
Ubaldini, Ugolino ; of Faenza, Purg.

xiv. 124.
Ubaldo, Par. xi. 41.
Ubbriachi, //. xvii. 60.
Uberti, H. xxiii. 110.
Uberti degli, Farinata, H. vi. 79 ; x.

32.
Uberti degli, Mosca, II. vi. 81 ; xxviii.

102.
Ubertino, Par. xii. 115.
Ubertino. See Donati.
Uberto, Par. xii. 111.
Uccellatojo, Par. xv. 104.

Vecchio, Par. xv. 110.

Venedico. See Caccianimico

Venetians. H. xxi. 7.

Venice, Par. xix. 138.

Venus, Purg. xxvii. 94.

Vercelli, H. xxviii. 71.

Verde, Purg. iii. 127. Par. viii. 66.

Verona, H. xv. 124. Purg. xviii. 117.

Veronese, H. xx. 66.

Veronica, Par. xxxi. 95.

VerrucMo, II. xxvii. 43.

Vesulo, H. xvi. 95.

Ughi, Par. xvi. 86.

Ugo, Par. xvi. 127.

Ugolino. See Glierardeschi, Fantolini,

and Ubaldini.
Uguccione, son of Count Ugolino de'

Gherardesclii, H. xxxiii. 88.
Vicenza, Par. xi. 47.
Victor Saint, Hugues of, Par. xii. 125.
Victor Saint, Richard of, Par. x. 127.
Vigne delle, Piero, II. xiii. 60.
Virgil, passim.
Visconti de', Galeazzo ; of Milan,

Purg. viii. 80, 108.
Visconti de', Nino ; di Gallura, if.

xxii. 82. Purg. viii. 53, 81, 108.
Visdomini, Par. xvi. 110.
Vitaliano. See Dente.
Ulysses, H. xxvi. 56. Purg. xix. 21.

Par. xxvii. 77.
Urania, Purg. xxix. 39.
Urban I. Par. xxvii. 41.
Urbiciani. See Buonaggiunta.
Urbino, H. xxvii. 27.
Urbisaglia, Par. xvi. 72.
Utioa, Purg. i. 74.

William, Marquis of Montferrat,

Purg. vii. 136.
William, of Orange, Par. xviii. 43.
William II. of Sicily, Par. xx. 57.
Winceslaus II. Purg. vii. 102. Par.

xix. 123.

Xerxes, Purg. xxviii. 70. Par. viii.
130.

Zanche, Michel, II. xxii. 88 ; xxxiii.

143.
Zeno, II. iv. 136.
Zeno, San, Purg. xviii. 118.
Zita, Santa, H. xxi. 37.

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